Getting very curious now.

Also, there's a way to see a starbase modules requirements before you try to put it on a starbase?

v2 Release

I don't even know where to start.  I've done so much and had this back-burnered for so long I can't just rattle off everything that makes it different from v1.1.  I'm pretty sure I've fixed all known bugs.  The majority of the work has been in further modifying the TechTrees to optimize them for the AI and, in my opinion, to improve them in general.  Let's see what I can think of . . .

• The weapons were changed as described in this post.  The short version is that the 3 different weapon types are identical and that all races have the same weapons.  There were too many issues with the old weapons and it was just too great a task for me to try balancing them.
• I changed the ethics techs a bit.  I never quite liked the flavor or arrangement of them.  I also added a galactic achievement for the neutral tech.
• There are no longer any "spacer" techs that provide no bonus at all, acting only as a stepping stone to the next tech.  Every tech provides some kind of bonus or unlocks some weapon, improvement, or module.
• I did away with all techs that provide fleet modules - Fleet Warp Bubbles, Tulon Focus, etc.  I kept them in literally until the last minute - like earlier this week -  because it felt wrong to take them out and also because I didn't want to deal with the complaints that are sure to come.  The bottom line is that they're very time-expensive techs and the AI just doesn't have any clue how to use them.  Not only does is take the AI away from researching useful techs for 10 or 20 weeks at a time, but since they don't actually use them it gives the player an unfair advantage.
• The Drengin and Korath manufacturing techs pretty extensively rearranged, and I added an intermediate tech/improvement between Slave Pits and Slave Canyons - the Slave Complex.  They just seemed to need something in the middle.
• Almost forgot - I buffed the heck out of the Trade bonuses.  The trade techs now give +100% rather than 10%.  I think I buffed every instance of a trade bonus from the custom abilities screen to the Korx race bonuses.  I just wanted trade to matter more.  It could probably stand a bit more of a bonus, but I didn't want to overdo it without more testing.

Well, those are the major things I can think of.  There are other things, I'm sure.  I'll just toss it out there for everyone to check out.  I do have a couple concerns, though.

1. My new defenses may be too powerful.  It looks great when I watch the AI play games, but I worry that it may be too easy for players to exploit.  You'll just have to let me know how it works for you.
2. After discovering that deleting the "temporary" xml files allowed the AI to fully utilize my changes, it occurred the me that the Drengin and Korath and perhaps Yor may actually be a bit overdone.  Maybe not.  Again, I rely on your feedback.
3. I'm pretty sure there have to be some bugs running around in there.  Let me know what you find and I'll deal with it ASAP.

And without further ado, here it is.  After nearly a year, I give you Tolmekian's TechTree fix v2.

Tolmekian's TechTree Fix v2 - No colonizing minors, but I did add the code that should make them at least somewhat intelligent.

Tolmekian's TechTree Fix v2 + MOOII Minors - You know the drill.  Start the game, quicksave, and reload.  Bam. Instant colonizing MOOII minors.

Hope you enjoy it.

Unfortunately, no.  AIPersonality 7 (Drengin, Korath, Yor) is fundamentally bugged.  That is, it's hard coded and not something that can be fixed by modding.  AIPersonality 10 (Torian and Iconian) is also bugged.  Our only hope is that they follow up the minimal 2.04 patch with a substantial update that addresses these known issues.

However, even when set to Generic, many races will fail miserably because of numerous bugs in their tech trees.  Bugs like designating Space Weapons as Point Defense rather than Weapons.  That means that 3-4 races won't ever research space weapons unless someone else has missiles and they try to defend against it.  Ever have those games where the Altarians or Korx never made a single warship, then got annihilated when the fighting started?  That's why.

If you want to know the full extent of it, follow the link in the original post to the Space Weapons Fix mod and read that thread.  It's actually really bad for some races, like the Iconians.

This mod fixes those issues and many other issues in the Twilight XML files.  You can use AIPersonaltiy 11 (Generic, Altarian, Korx, Arcean) or 8 (Thalan, Terran, Drath,Krynn).

So you're confirming that the AI will not use Terror Stars? I'd seen reports of this, but I've never been completely certain as I haven't ever seen any AI finish research on all five techs.

It might be a worthwhile experiment to try building one, then giving it to an AI to see what they do with it. In fact, I might try this myself.

Well, I've seen the AI research Terror Star techs, and I've even seen them focus on it, but I've never seen one actually finish researching all five techs. However, this is at least partially a matter of how long their research times are, so I haven't seen anything thus far that conclusively shows me an AI cannot use Terror Stars. I've read claims that they won't build or use one even if they research all the techs, but I have no evidence for that.

So I'm going to fire up a test game where I give myself all the techs, build a Terror Star (or auto-spawn one, if I can find the right cheat), give it to an AI who's at war, and see what happens. My experiment isn't really about how to get the AI to use Terror Stars, merely to find out if they're utterly incapable of it. If so, there's no point in trying to fix the problems with the techs in the first place.

Hey Tolmekian.  Never posted in these forums before, but  I'm a big fan of your ToTA fix v1.1.  Last night I downloaded v2, but I haven't installed it yet and now that I read your notes a bit more closely, I'm wondering if I should.

 See, I like stuff like Warp Bubbles and Tulan Waffle Irons and all that.  And even though the AIs won't make proper use of these tech tree branches, I say screw them.  I'm not hardcore enough to exploit any kind of advantage these techs might give me over the computer - I'm just in it for the funzies, you know?

 Also, my custom race are traders, and even though I haven't yet played this new version, I'm wondering if these trade bonus' might not be just a little bit on the crazy side. I know a lot of people don't put much stock in the old trade values, but I never thought they were all that broken before.  Maybe in need of a little boost, but am I correct in assuming that each +100 will actually DOUBLE the value of each trade route?  So with all three trade techs (not counting Neutral Shipping - does that give +100 too?), the total bonus would be +300%, or four times what trade was previously worth?  As I said, I've yet to run the mod, and yeah my head might hurt, but is that right?  And what about my custom civ with it's +20% trade bonus?  Will that translate into another +200%?  That just seems like an insane boost to income and I'd be hard pressed not to feel like I was cheating.

 So how much "better" is v2 over v 1.1?  Is there a significant increase in the AIs performance, or can I keep the old version and not regret it?  After all, all I'm really looking for is a "fix" for a broken game.  I do appreciate all the work you've put into this mod though.  I wish I could make my own but it's all super science to me, so I must rely on the hard work of people like you.  Thanks!

PS, I don’t suppose there’d be an easy way for me to just add those deleted modules back into the game?

qrtxian and MabusAltarn: I guess that's that.  I'll try maybe changing Terror Stars to Defense and see if the AI leaves the techs alone.

MabusAltarn:  I actually don't want the AI to research Starbase Fortification.  It's a long, fairly expensive branch with low payoff in the grand scheme of things.  The consensus seems to be that arming starbases is wasted effort after a certain point - a fairly early point.  To make it worthwhile to invest in starbase weapons and defense, the modules need to be more easily available and not as costly or cumbersome to install.  Weapons and defenses also need to be more powerful.

I'm addressing these issues in a number of ways:

• I made starbase modules free in v1.1.  No more paying to upgrade.  Not only is this nice for the player, but it's critical from the AI perspective.  AI money management is horrible, so they usually don't have extra cash laying around.  Ever wonder why the AI never adds modules to its influence starbases?  It's because the first module costs 500bc.  Players of v1.1 should have noticed that the AI will actually build up its starbases fairly well.
• In v2.1, there is no more Starbase Fortification branch.  Weapon and defense modules are spread among the appropriate weapon and defense techs.  Since they're more widely available, they'll be more widely used.
• I added a Starbase Defenses line of modules that mirrors the Battle Stations line.  Giving starbases basic defenses in all categories is much easier.
• I removed the module requirement for all weapon and defense modules.  All weapons simply require Battle Stations and all defenses simply require Starbase Defenses.  Now, if you want to fortify a starbase in the mid-to-late game, you don't have to send 10 constructors to build up through hopelessly obsolete modules.  You can just build Battle Stations and/or Starbase Defenses, then install the highest level modules available to you.  In v2 I made the mistake of forcing you to build up through Starbase Fortifications.  Now that I'm focusing on starbases, I realize that I made a mistake.
• I made the weapon and defense modules more powerful.  Battle Stations and Starbase Defenses now give 2,4,8, and 16 bonus in each category.  In addition, the higher end weapon and defense modules are more powerful.

I think this is going to be a big improvement in starbase fortification.  I'm running my first playtest currently.  I'll let you know how it turns out.

Next up - unintended consequences of making the stock, non-colonizing minor races too intelligent!

PS - I'll reply to you, too, Wetballs.

Funny you should mention that.  The unintended consequences of making the stock minors intelligent is that they build constructors and start grabbing up all the resources while the majors are still in the colony rush.  My playtesting shows that there is a sweet spot for constructor building - after the colony rush and before the arms race.  During that time the AI pumps out constructors and does the bulk of its starbase work.  During the rush and arms race constructors are a bit of an afterthought.

For the minors, no colony ships means they can start sending constructors out as soon as their scouts find resources.  Turns out they also rush Trade technology and start sending out freighters, too.  Near the end of year 2 in my current playtest, the Jessuins are the most powerful civ because they actually have a warship while the majors probably don't even have a weapon theory.  I get the impression that intelligent minors may end up being somewhat powerful even without colonizing.

Oh I'll definitely try the mod out - I just haven't had time to play for a bit.  Also, I didn't mean to come off as though I was complaining about free stuff on the internet, so I'm sorry if that's what it sounded like.  As I said I was a big fan of the earlier version, and not just the improved AI performance, but a lot of the other fixes too.  For instance, the new arrangement of the farm techs is far and away better than what we had before (and a lot easier to manage).  Plus, I never even knew there was such a thing as a Galactic Stock Exchange!

About the trade techs – I’ll certainly play the mod and let you know how it goes.  I think trade income might look more or less important depending on what kind of games people play.  What I mean is, because it’s a fixed wad of money, it might not seem like much if you play with maxed out habitable planet settings and so have dozens of colonies paying taxes.  On the other hand, if habitable planets are set to be more rare, trade income will be much more significant since you won’t have as much tax revenue.  In both cases, the game only allows you a maximum of 12 trade routes, and those routes are going to pay the same whether you have 4 colonies or 40 (as far as I know).  So maybe I’m just biased since I usually play with habitable planets set to “occasional” in a huge galaxy.  Or maybe it might seem to others as though taxes aren’t worth much since they play with habitable planets set to “common”.  And/or maybe they only play Good or Evil aligned civs, and don’t have access to Neutral Shipping (or waste customization points on extra trade routes), so they’re used to only having 8 trade routes available.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to playing, and will post a more informed opinion later (though it might not be very soon).  It looks awesome!  Thanks again!

PS,  Also, I dunno if you were joking, but please don’t make a special mod just for little ol’ me simply to include Warp Bubbles!  I’d feel like a jackass!  (Even though Warp Bubbles and Tulan Crock Pots do help to simulate carriers.  How could they not include carriers in Galciv2???  They said “carriers wouldn’t add anything to the game”, but then they go and add TERROR STARS?!?  What do Terror Stars add, except a bunch of confused AIs?  To quote Bugs Bunny “It don’t make no sense!”)

Another PS,  Sorry about the “Wetballs”.  I made this account a couple of years ago to download stuff, never thinking that I might actually post.  But now here I am apologizing for a ridiculous forum name.

I've actually seen this a lot while testing default  AI research on auto play but never while actually playing. Kinda weird, probably a bug.

For the record, you don't need mega events to get pirates - there are a couple of "normal" events that spawn them, and then there are the pirates that pop up when a civilization is eliminated. Of course, none of that had happened yet.

Under the basic Galciv2\mods folder -not- in the Twilight folder, then you need to go into the game and tell it to load it under options.

Interesting results on playtest 1 of v2.1.  Minors end up getting crushed fairly easily despite a strong initial performace.  Definitely their best showing and interesting to watch. 3 of the 6 are still holding on by virtue of good placement, decent fleets, and strong starbases.  Not only did the minors capture resources and build other starbases, but the new module structure allowed them to fortify pretty well.  The Akilians have a starbase with attack and defense totals around 20.  The starbases themselves serve to draw a fair amount of flak and thin the incoming fleets.

I noticed that trade helps the minors immensely.  They may only draw tax revenues of about 100-125bc, but some had trade worth 200-300bc.  I also noticed that the majors put a lot more effort into researching trade techs and sending out freighters.  Usually trade is somewhat anemic and a number of races don't even bother.  This time around everybody has freighters out and a few had up to 6 trade routes going.  I can see how a player might completely break the system, but I love the way the AI  has been using it.

Once again the Korath and Yor are dominating the galaxy.  I think it has to do with their bonuses and the way I set up their custom points.  Time to go back to the method of making identical custom races to test the TechTrees.

More to come . . .