Edit: Can Thalan Starbase Modules be balanced around their cost? If, for example, module giving +4 to missile, beam and mass driver attack cost 250, and one giving +15 to all cost 1500, AI wouldn't have money to build that module soon after getting this tech, would it?

I took away their attack and defense modules not their trade, assist, production, etc, etc. You're still going to get some amazing modules out of Hyperion Starbases, just not one that gives 300 weapon power and 300 defense.

I don't think you got what I tried to say. You make good point, extreme planets are a big drain if you only have one tech. Since the iconians start with toxic and aquatic terraforming perhaps it would serve them well to grab their 2nd tech sooner rather than later. Such a think can be achieved by changing the category, cost or simply the AIvalue. If they grab it quickly then they won't have much of a problem, they simply need to prioritise  their reseach better.

And the Iconians can research REALLY well.

Like I said, I'll take look.

It can be. I'll change the description to state they're fantastic traders or something and I'll change the Trade tech description for it as well.

I'll have a closer look at Starbase module costs in general.

Thanks. Also, make a note which civ you were playing it might give us a clue.

No need .

I do all my editing in Visual Studio. It warns me if there's an error in the XML syntacs. I've written a program that runs through all the data files for me and checks everything. Take a look:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/m447rgrdev1bp30/GC2TOAMV.zip?dl=0

Just drop it into any folder and run it. Pick the mod's folder and then set the game's folder (the Galciv2 folder NOT the Twilight folder).

You can safely ignore the Tag errors. This means a tech's ID in TechTree.XML (Industry, Weapons, etc) doesn't match the tech's ID in a race techtree. 

They're not, that comes a little later. It's when you get Hyperion Starbases. It may be an expensive tech to get but once you get it your starbases become indestructable.

The Thalans dont research seperate modules, they get all of it in one tech. This makes the weapon and defense modules extremely potent. Now the AI has a tendency to send fleet after fleet and starbases and there's simply no way they can destroy one.

In short, that's a bad thing, because it means your starbases are no longer of concern, in fact, they become an exploit. Keeping your starbases safe should be something that is a concern and with the original Thalan SB modules this simply wasn't the case.

I came up with an idea on how to nerf Yor in culture and diplomacy without giving them penalties to start with. By changing bonuses they get from government techs. I also didn't like the idea of cybernetic species going to vote, so i written new descriptions for them. Note, as I am not a native English speaker, someone may need to look at them and fix any mistakes. 

<Culture ID="InterGov">
<DisplayName>Interstellar Collective</DisplayName>
<Description>Allows us to begin researching advanced types of governments.</Description>
<Details>Each culture has its own government system and as inorganic species, we don't operate as other civilizations. But there are things we can learn from them and filter out unnecessary parts at the same time.||Interstellar Collective puts us on the path to more efficient governing systems.</Details>

<Culture ID="StarRep">
<DisplayName>Collective Merging</DisplayName>
<Description>Allows us to incorporate our citizens in decision making.</Description>
<Details>As we are not constricted by boundaries of flesh, we can easily upload our minds into mainframes and share our thoughts almost instantly. Meatbags would call this "voting", but it's much better then that.||Our citizens can now decide on their ruling party, whether or not to go to war and what type of government they want. So keep your people happy and they will "think" in your favour.</Details>
<Cost>850</Cost> (was 600)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

+10 Morale, Economy or other any bonus instead.

<Culture ID="StarDem">
<DisplayName>Collective Thought</DisplayName>
<Description>Improves on Collective Merging.</Description>
<Details>Better access to mainframes and faster servers give us greater amounts of data from our people, so it's harder to reach satisfying consensus.||But guess what? Citizens sharing same ideas and goals are more efficient. So as long as they just agree with YOU, we're safe.</Details>
<Cost>1700</Cost> (was 1500)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

Military and Social Production +5 each.

<Culture ID="StarFed">
<DisplayName>Collective Brain</DisplayName>
<Description>Improves on Collective Thought.</Description>
<Details>Now that everyone has access to the mainframes, we call it Collective Brain. And yes, that was the first thing we reached consensus on.||Because of sheer amount of different ideas and thoughts inside the Brain, it's more important then ever to keep your people happy. But when they are, they work in unison never seen before.</Details>
<Cost>3400</Cost> (was 3000)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

Military and Social Production +5 each.

If you think this idea is bad, well, so be it I just don't like penalty to influence and diplomacy when they never had those penalties before. If anything, I'll just mod for myself it when the final update is finished.

As for colonization techs for Iconians, yes, if they go for them earlier it will help them, but why is it that all first colonization techs make the worlds so slow to build up without the Advanced tech? I noticed this a couple of updates ago, but never gave it more thought then today.

Edit: in GC3 Yor Collective is now Yor Singularity (a superorganism), so above descriptions would fit as an evolution/merging of Yor minds.

Edit2: I can write some descriptions for Drengin, Korath and maybe Thalans, as I don't think voting suits them as well, if you are ok with changing any descriptions at all.

Ooh,  I like where you are going with those Oshee.  Let me give those a try.  I am a native English speaker,  and computer geek to boot,  lets see what I can do:

<Culture ID="InterGov">
<DisplayName>Interstellar Collective</DisplayName>
<Description>Allows us to begin researching advanced types of governments.</Description>
<Details>We do not recognize a 'government' as most organic species do.   However,  by taking advantage of our  massive parallel processing potential we can begin to explore algorithms to increase productivity and efficiency.||We must proceed cautiously;  too much distributed planning across the vastness of space has the potential to destabilize and possibly even splinter the collective.</Details>

<Culture ID="StarRep">
<DisplayName>Collective Evaluation</DisplayName>
<Description>Allows us to incorporate our citizens in decision making.</Description>
<Details>Breakthroughs in distributed processing allow for limited local evaluation and feedback as part of a coherent whole.   Every so often we must synchronize and harmonize these local states so that the collective remains stable;  meatbags would call this 'voting', but it's much better than that. ||Note that limited destabilization can be caused by extreme variations in local maxima,   which should be avoided if possible.  Meatbags would call this 'unhappiness',  but what do they know?</Details>
<Cost>850</Cost> (was 600)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

(bonues tbd?   efficiency is all about doing "more" with what you've got,  so maybe start with nice +social,  say +10?)

<Culture ID="StarDem">
<DisplayName>Collective Planning</DisplayName>
<Description>Improves on Collective Evaluation.</Description>
<Details>Improvements in algorithms,  local computing capacity,  and trans-planet communication bandwidth have made it possible for increased freedom of local execution,  resulting in even greater advances in production efficiency.   The possibility of destabilization still exists,  but the rewards are worth the risk.</Details>
<Cost>1700</Cost> (was 1500)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

(bonuses tbd?   see above..  more +social and +military this time,  +10 each?)

<Culture ID="StarFed">
<DisplayName>Collective Thought</DisplayName>
<Description>Improves on Collective Planning.</Description>
<Details>They said it couldn't be done,  but hyper-improvements in bandwidth,  local processing power and algorithms have brought us to the point where we may legitimately call ourselves a Collective Brain. And yes, that was the first thing we reached consensus on.||Because of the sheer amount of different potential planning scenarios inside the Brain, it's more important then ever to avoid situations with extreme local maxima.  Keep your people 'happy',  as the meatbags would say.  Because when we are,  our efficiency and productivity are near-perfect.</Details>
<Cost>3400</Cost> (was 3000)
<DiplomacyAbility>0</DiplomacyAbility>
<CultureAbility>0</CultureAbility>

(bonuses tbd?  more +mil,  and +research now that you've got an actual brain.. +10 mil,  +20 research?)

That would give +20 mil, +20 social, and +20 research for doing all three.  Anything less than that and I'm not sure I would bother with the research,   but again.. I'm pretty noobish when it comes to actual numbers and balance.   Could take some of that out of the starting Yor ability to balance,  I suppose.

@OShee.

Nice descriptions (Thanks Silas for correcting them). I'll put them in.

Got any more descriptions?

Absolutely! Go for it!

@Maiden.

Thanks for the Minor update I'll take a look.

Just the attack and defense module the others are staying in. For the record, I to had no idea Gaunathor had buffed those modules THAT high either. For the record, I'm still leaving the Thalans with regular attack/def modules. They'll get an edge in every other area.

Any more suggestions concerning starbases, costs, module performance, etc?

Into what exactly? Can you please elaborate.

The Super Traded SA grants the player any tech that has +Trade bonus. Aka, making more money out of trade. Since Trade 1 has +25 to tradebonus it's unlocked like Advanced and Master Trade. But, if you move the +trade bonus to Advanced Trade the Korx will start with Advanced and Master trade but with out Trade 1. This means they'll build colony ships instead of freighters until their get Trade. When they do they can take full advantage of it.

Just take a look at the next test version.

The Arceans don't use their Lite Constructor module when they build their ships. But, if you can find a way to make them we could introduce a cheaper version of the Trade module just for the Korx.

Not everything but the structures are cheaper so you get them sooner so you progress faster.

Is anyone else of the opinion the game moves to fast?

Noted.

In other news. I had no luck with the Korx Trade tech it seems super trader does a bit more than I remember. It might be possible but it's a frigging hassle. Feel free to experiment though and let me know if you manage it.

I've implemented the descriptions and the costs. Very nice work. The descriptions fit the Yor perfectly as does the slightly increased cost. But let's hold off putting more bonuses into their techtree, alright? The Yor are in a good place.

Edit: I made the Yor government techs untradable and unstealable. 

The Initial Colony from 12 production back to 14.

Because there is something odd happening there I can't put my finger on it, but I saw the same stuff a week ago, 1 SP on extreme planets and focus not being able to change that.

Let me give it a try^^

Affirmative.

Personally I like long epic games. But we have to remind us why these costs have been reduced initially - because the AI in vanilla has alot of planets were Tier4+tier5 improvements are queued and they will never be finished.

Me, as a player, I play for 1/49/50 or even 1/99/0 for most parts of the game and can therefore finish everything but the AI doesn't.

There are also some AIP that will go for 100/0/0 at some point and try to achieve a military victory, I've seen this with Yor many times midgame. No more research, they don't even build constructors or freighters anymore, even when resources or trade routes are available.

Nevertheless, some imrpovements are too cheap. That even causes bugs that can be exploited by players and sometimes even paradoxical high costs... I'm gonna take a look into it.

I've taken a look at how the game does calculate the social production, in order to find out what caused this 1 showing up on all planets.

Essentially the global slider + the social spending slider are calculated first, with each result getting truncated to a full number.

An example from a current testgame on a normal planet:

12 industry total from Initial Colony * 0.83 global spending slider = 9,96 ~= 9

9 * 0,22 social slider = 1,98 ~=1

1 * 1,6 racial social = 1,6 ~= 1

Note that 22% social slider & 83% global spending setting is pretty much.

If we compare that to 14 industry:

14 * 0,83 = 11,62 ~= 11

11 * 0,22 = 2,4 ~= 2

2 * 1,6 = 3,2 ~= 3

Nevertheless, on extreme planets it will still be only 1.

And if sliders go below somewhere 75% and/or 10% etc then it will also make no difference.

That's why our top priority should be to get the AI to raise his spending slider to 100% and keep it there. If that's not possible then we'll have to raise the Initial Colony building to at least 20 industry (and do something for his income to not kill him with the increased cost)

Mabus, I've analyzed a few testgames with Korx without the "Trade" technology (you need to erase both trade routes + trade bonus to make it effective).

Results were:

- After 2 years Korx still haven't maximized their routes

- They are at war really often which also kills alot of routes

- They research into trade technologies without having freighters running (Fortified Freighters)

- Tradeincome is from 1%-3% max of their global income

Unrelated:

- They research alot into Planetary Invasion in year0, which takes them around 25 turns (!)

- They also research alot into Soil Impr, Habitat etc while having alot of empty planets because of see above

The Korx AIP is totally idiotic when it comes to money spending. He will constantly quickbuy stuff but *overbuy* so he's -200 -100 bcs. Then he will instantly lower his global spending slider to only 20%, so he can recover. After 3 or 4 turns he is back into normal and quickbuys again.... his global slider stays at 20%-30% throughout the first year, and very seldomly goes up in year 2.

He also keeps taxes very low, moral globally at 80%. Then after some time, towards the end of year 1, once his economy is established, he jacks up espionage high instead of buying improvements for his empty planets. I've seen him having more than 10 unused spies.

TBH the +50 espionage on the (Korxs) Mercantile Party should be scrapped with something better. Espionage isn't really a useful stat but can totally screw a races early development. I've made a few tests by taking this stat completely out of the game and everything goes far more smooth, with the sole exception that the Top AI has 1 throttle less to deal with. Nevertheless I think for Mercantile a Purchase Now Reduction would be better.

More later...

I knew I shouldn't have stayed up so late writing the Yor stuff.

/facepalm

I totally forgot about the inherent econ bonuses to the government techs.   Maybe cut the ones I suggested in half.  Maiden?   You have a better handle on the numbers than I do,   I was more interested in rounding out OShee's fun descriptions than getting the bonuses right.

Some kind of inaccuracy. Upgrading a 25 SP structure with a 35 SP structure required only 5 SP. Paradoxically, overbuilding the 25 SP with a later tier 45 SP wouldn't make 20 SP difference but 30.

I think this is the case since forever, but traditionally when there's 25, 50 or more SP requirements between each tiers it's hardly noticable.

I see the Korx having to be at 20-30% global spending in a lot of games. During the first year. At that setting, even normal planets will have 0 social. Planets with 2 factories will show 1 SP. And that, already at 16 industry from the Initial Colony.

Anyway, I've made some progression on this.

It seems like when the AI is overbuying stuff (and going negative) he will not instantly reduce his slider to 20% but wait one turn. So IF he already makes around +200 bcs/turn that usually gets him out of the negative and he keeps his sliders up like it should be.

So the Purchase Now Reduction will help here, as does an early Trade income.

On medium maps vs 4 AI painful abundant habitable common planets/stars no techtrade/broker/steal no Minors I've seen Korx develop an early trade that would make ~30% of their total income, and it stayed there for 2 years. In these games Korx had no trouble keeping everything at 100% - even their espionage slider. They still got surplus bcs, but he didn't use that money. Maybe he will use it via ship-upgrades.

His sliders seem to favour research, it's mostly 20/20/60, sometimes even 15/30/55 or 30/15/55. That could explain why he has trouble establishing colonies, he's simply not having the MP for a lot of ships. Later this will mean a low MMR.

As such, it would be best for him to dive into labs + research - that, at least, would make his few ships fast (or strong). But I've never seen him researching that much, although he could afford it easily (at least, on the "good" maps I've seen from him)

Instead once he got money his bunkering it into espionage. Crazy, it's his #1 expenses stat and generally makes 30% of his global expenses. It's worth mentioning that his trade-income does influence the money he can invest into espionage just like taxes do. Sometimes it does totally eat up his entire trade income. That's more of a mechanic I'd expect from the Krynn....

What I would like to see from them is that they build or try to build the Galactic Bazaar (which they already have the tech for), it might help them stay out of trouble. I'm surprised of how often war is being declared on Korx even when there's good trade coming through them.

Maybe they could use some extra range. It would probably boost their SA a little. Freighters should always go a long way, because usually, direct neighbors will be fast at war because of some diplomacy penalties ("your growing influence" + "we know what you're doing" [once you have Transports near them]) and they net more bcs then.

BTW it can be done to decrease their module cost, as well with the Arcean Lite module, but it's not 100% clean solution. But it might also be interesting for personal mods.

Basically the costs of the standard mod can be decreased by using <AltCost> and then making a race-specific GA as prerequisite. The problem is that this seems to work only on sensors...

<Sensor Name="ConstructorModule">
<DisplayName>Constructor Module</DisplayName>
<Description>Allows this ship to construct starbases. You only need ONE per ship.</Description>
<Cost>70</Cost>
<AltCost>30</AltCost>
<AltCostPrereq>GA:Stellar Forge</AltCostPrereq>
<Size>20</Size>
<Model>ConstructorModuleLeft</Model>
<Ability>ConstructStarbase</Ability>
<Thumbnail>ConstructorModule</Thumbnail>
<Category>Capacity</Category>
<FlavorText0>Genral Industrial Ltd. Model 105 "Base Maker". Contains everything necessary to convert ship and components into a starbase or addition to a starbase.</FlavorText0>
<FlavorText1>Aul Space Station Construction Set.</FlavorText1>
<FlavorText2>B-309 Star Station Creation Matrix. Converts ship into a Star Station or add-on to existing Star Station.</FlavorText2>
<FlavorText3>Hithirl Starbase Module.</FlavorText3>
<FlavorText4>Space Center Creation Module.</FlavorText4>
<FlavorText5>Dread Starbase Module.</FlavorText5>
</Sensor>
<!--
<Module Name="LiteConstructorModule">
<DisplayName>Lite Constructor Module</DisplayName>
<Description>Unique to this civilization. Allows this ship to construct starbases. You only need ONE per ship.</Description>
<Cost>30</Cost>
<Size>20</Size>
<Model>ConstructorModuleLeft</Model>
<Ability>ConstructStarbase</Ability>
<Thumbnail>ConstructorModule</Thumbnail>
<Category>Capacity</Category>
<Tech_Requirement>GloriousHistory</Tech_Requirement>
<FlavorText0>Genral Industrial Ltd. Model 105 "Base Maker". Contains everything necessary to convert ship and components into a starbase or addition to a starbase.</FlavorText0>
<FlavorText1>Aul Space Station Construction Set.</FlavorText1>
<FlavorText2>B-309 Star Station Creation Matrix. Converts ship into a Star Station or add-on to existing Star Station.</FlavorText2>
<FlavorText3>Hithirl Starbase Module.</FlavorText3>
<FlavorText4>Space Center Creation Module.</FlavorText4>
<FlavorText5>Dread Starbase Module.</FlavorText5>
</Module>
-->
<Sensor Name="TradeModuleLeft">
<DisplayName>Trade Module</DisplayName>
<Description>Gives the vessel the ability to establish a trade route with another planet. Only ONE needed on a ship.</Description>
<Cost>20</Cost>
<AltCost>30</AltCost>
<AltCostPrereq>GA:Festival of Capitalism</AltCostPrereq>
<Size>20</Size>
<Model>TradeModuleLeft</Model>
<Ability>Trade</Ability>
<Thumbnail>TradeModule</Thumbnail>
<Category>Capacity</Category>
<Tech_Requirement>Trade</Tech_Requirement>
</Sensor>

The modules will show a Sensor:0 but will work as commonly known. However, the intitial Constructor/Freighter design isn't reduced in cost, it seems like it is hardcoded. But once the AI designs his own ships (Korx Constructor M1...) the reduction is integrated, and that happens right in turn 1.

The Arcean Stellar Forge needs to be a GA as well in this example.