Proportions 2.1 available - Page 4

PvK · #31 April 11th, 2002, 09:07 PM

BTW, it looks like the Proportions 2.1 AI does design and build colony ships... eventually. With the new Gold patch supporting new means of controlling AI production, however, the next thing to mod is clearly some better Proportions AI's.

PvK

oleg · #32 April 12th, 2002, 01:14 AM

So, does it work with SE 1.67 ?
I want to install the new patch but reluctant to do it if it is incompatible with Proportions.

Weapon balance issue :

Shard cannons an null-space projectors got a boost in Proportions to compensate for new "internal" armour.
But Temporal Shifter (temporal null-space weapons) has not been changed. I suggest +20 to its damage (exactly the same bonus as to N-S projector)

oleg · #33 April 12th, 2002, 01:47 AM

As a Last resort you can simply low the colony ship cost. It will not affect the game dynamics too much I think. The bottleneck is still the extreme dependence of construction rate from population and very high cost of hugh level cultural facilities. The slow speed of colonisers are a factor too. I believe that small tweak of colony ship cost should solve this problem.

PvK · #34 April 12th, 2002, 02:59 AM

Well, actually it's now looking like a fluke or intermittant problem, or a 1.66 issue rather than a 1.67 issue. I only saw it not building colony ships in one test game in 1.66, and apparently in an all-tech-known (not really appropriate for Proportions, anyway) game in 1.67, which I might just not have run long enough. So, I'll keep an eye on it, but I think I may have been prematurely worried.

The AI tweaks though are working out well. It appears that once I get some AI's customized for Proportions and Gold 1.67, it will be a lot more effective. <evil grin>

PvK

Schwarzbart · #35 April 12th, 2002, 04:21 PM

I reduced the Cargo Storage of the Cargo Bay's even lower! I don't think that a Cargo Bay can store more then its size.

bstripp · #36 April 12th, 2002, 04:35 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Schwarzbart:
I reduced the Cargo Storage of the Cargo Bay's even lower! I don't think that a Cargo Bay can store more then its size.

While that is certainly up to you, I can't see the logic behind it. The size of the cargo bay is a weight IE 20kT, not a space like m3. So cargo bay advances would be things that allow you to secure cargo with the lightest structure and material allowed.

Of course if it makes a better game for you, then go for it! But there is no problem for a cargo bay holding more than it weighs.

Schwarzbart · #37 April 12th, 2002, 04:45 PM

quote:
Originally posted by bstripp:

While that is certainly up to you, I can't see the logic behind it. The size of the cargo bay is a weight IE 20kT, not a space like m3. So cargo bay advances would be things that allow you to secure cargo with the lightest structure and material allowed.

If I understand your answear right then is the ship size of a Fighter its weight and the Ship size of a Escort its volume?

oleg · #38 April 12th, 2002, 05:50 PM

I checked proportions with 1.67 patch and there seems to be no problems with AI and colony ships.
(1 planet start, low starting tech)

PvK · #39 April 12th, 2002, 06:46 PM

Yes, I think I was overreacting to a test game where none of the AI's had done any colonizing in the first three years. It was Version 1.66, and I think I was probably just surprised by their slowness to build a colony ship, but I think now it was because of their AI files being that way and not because of a bug, so I should've tested more.

PvK

PvK · #40 April 12th, 2002, 07:00 PM

As for cargo bays, yes 4 million population is about the max per transport in Proportions, given highest tech ship sizes and components. I'd say it's generous too, realistically speaking. If this were SE3 and I could differentiate between cargo storage types, I might make it worse in terms of cost, because once you have four million people in a space ship, you have to keep them alive for months or even years in deep space... good luck doing that efficiently! Oh, you'll "just" have four MILLION cryogenic hybernation compartments? Ok... total price tag...

As for whether a cargo bay should be able to store more than its size, I think SE4 is too abstract and undetailed in its measurements to take all of the measurements literally. Also, bstripp is quite right that mass and volume are different things, and I would add that items like people or space fighters themselves are one thing, while the mass and volume of what is needed to keep them functional is something else. Unfortunately, they're all on the same scale (kT). In short, don't take the masses TOO literally in terms of imagining what they represent - they are only accurate as effective measures of what you'll be able to cram in a location, or not.

I would also say that I don't think a space fighter would ever actually have a mass of even ONE kiloton, unless it was something unlike what I and most SF writers have generally imagined, or was made out of hyperdense alloy or whatever (which would tend to make it vastly less maneuverable than a lighter fighter). SE4 though only has one measure of size, and a fighter also needs supplies, maintenance crews, launch space and so on. Also, in order to be able to design the components on a fighter and have a limit, integral sizes means they have to be more than one kT, since that's SE4's smallest measure. So, either you accept that that there is a lot of abstraction going on, or you imagine enormous fighters, or you decide that each fighter represents a squadron, or whatever. Personally, I tend to imagine each fighter as one fighter that is probably well under 1 kT, but for purposes of effective cargo space required to store a fighter and the personnel/droids/supplies/spare parts/ operating space & base equipment needed to actually operate it for months on end, that's what the size represents when in cargo mode.

PvK