The effect will only start working if you upgrade such a ship, and only carry the bonus if, at least, one mod for each individual weapon- or defense type is present. 

So if you get +3 +3 +3 on weapons you need to upgrade that ship to 1 beam, 1 missile & 1 MD to get +4 +4 +4 (for starting weapons). Because the option to research multiple branches of weapons is totally counter-productive, such a design is usually non-optimal. However, there are thinkable exceptions; for example before the first wars break out one usually can trade for some Tier1 or Tier2 weapons and turn some of his Surveyors into Heavy Fighters. With further advances into weapon research the anomaly-bonus will become rather minor...

True. In the campaigns against the Dread Lords speed is one of the most important stats.

what do you mean?

That's partially because some AIs are coded to ignore all defenses completely. So if they don't trade for or steal them, they will build all-attack ships forever. However, Minors always research defenses...  

Research & Creativity, and some "Social" options, a little bit of everything, and they should become stronger as the game progresses. Many times when races develop different strengths its due to resource crystals or what SP they could build, not really much what a modder could do in that regard but actually I like the dynamics.

Krynn is the civ I designed purposefully to be an influence monster.

Thalan is one of the civs where I completely changed the game, so to speak, simply because the "High Maintenance cost early on" approach doesn't reliably work. I took them back to vanilla also influenced by some of the ideas Frogboy mentioned in an old thread. They are now also super-reproductive, only dwarfed by Torians.

I have to say, I am most proud of the Thalan design because it has a very unique feeling. Factories & Labs are incoroporated into one building (Hives). This makes it much harder (sometimes impossible) to specialize worlds. But the AI can easily use that design.

I've also switched/shuffled some AI personalities (Thalan is one of these - they will now also research into defenses) so you will see the civs act differently to the vanilla or CU experience.   

Yes. Some civs are penalized in research but I thought it a good idea to give many of them at least a 1PP starting building. So if they catch a lot of planets they still can dominate this way. Yor have it however quite hard in that regard  

Many of the Invasion techniques are attributed to red technologies (weapons) that's why they get the same critical checking as weapons which carries hardcoded routines where I can't do anything. But that's fine. You basically get limited if you've been a proven hostile to other, engaged in too many wars or have a too-high military rating. Or broken treaties etc pp. The red techs also inflate most, and indeed the AI will use only the up-to-date recalculated cost when doing its math. Even if you sell these techs for cash etc.

The two tags a modder can use to influence this are

<AIValue>5</AIValue><WillingnessToTrade>50</WillingnessToTrade> [for Temporal Warfare]

The former is quite low (favourable) and the latter mediocre. I could up them but you would hardly see the difference. Some of the hardcoded routines are too severe. I think it's because late-game the research into weapons is basically what makes you win or loose the game, so the devs didn't want to have it too easy on simple techtrade games. 

@ Majesty. There are 2 other, even stronger, invasion techs where you can make enemies rebell to your side, one for Krynn and one for Korx.

Damage from one shot to another doesn't carry over. At least, not on the individual mod level. So if the attacker carries one weapon +10 it will have to fire 10 rounds to kill all drones. But if carries 10* a +1 mod it may clear them in the first round with extreme luck.

However, Drones aren't made to often survive battles. They're rather designed to be easily reproduced & replaced, always using such a design that a 1-drone-per-turn output is reached. If you then guard this planet with four fully outfitted MSBs you have your fleets re-up in no time. The losses the enemy carries will be much higher than yours.

However, this is a rather defensive tactic that can be effective in a suicidal-stalemate game or if you roleplay an Isolationist-Yor. Because effectively slowing down the enemy is also important to buy you time in order to catch the enemy into certain sweet spots where your Drones receive most support.

I won my first suicidal warfighting game this way, using the vanilla 2.042 TA and only Tiny Fighter, against a rampant Altarian

Indeed. Fleet Carrier sounds more like an overall category, not a class. But I wanted it to make it most obvious and didn't find anything more suitable. I'm not even satisfied with the hullname on which it is based of (Command Hull) but the thing is that hull/ship really isn't of much use for anything else. It's quite expensive and thus, even a luxury. The problem is I can't make it a strong fighting ship because you can fill fleets endlesslessy due to 0 logistics.

Yeah, the ongoing CU development was a major problem. I had to start over 2 times because, after some time, the CU changes got so manifold it turned out to be easier to take the CU final and reintegrate the FW development... And then we reimplemented farming again, and what not, but this time I couldn't follow because FW was already too much developed and that would simply create too many bugs or unbalances.

There's currently no work in progresses so you have all liberty at your hands. Because of the current good weather I'm rather spending the days outside and maybe finish the mod to 1.0 in winter. But I still need to have a creative input concerning the "theme" for some techtrees (that lack individualization or unique buildings or gameplay specifics) and that's something I can't really force.

Aynway you're welcome   

One thing I didn't mention about Thalans.  They build their own improvements now.  They used to trade for alien production techs to get around the high maintenance.  Eventually most of their facilities are alien, making the whole concept of a Thalan tech tree kinda pointless.  So far I like what you've done.

Quoting DMF,

reply 98

Where is Information Warfare invasion tactic?

@ Majesty.

I like it on a Cultural branch.  Not sure Majesty is quite the place, but it's okay.

I like the hull branch split.  As a general principle, splitting out techs that impact different attributes makes it not only easier to customize races, but gives a player a lot more flexibility to customize his game.  In my own case, I prefer smaller, harder to kill ships (and you'll see a bit of that in my description of Medium Scale Building), sometimes never even researching Massive size ships. 

Hyperion is a titan rather than a god, and the father of Helios (sun) and Selene (moon).  If the Hyperion techs are now super-projects rather than achievements, different names name be better.  But maybe not.  I'll give it some thought.

I did sometimes find the 1PP farms irritating.  I can't just build another farm to increase pop.  But I do understand why you've done it that way, and it is more realistic.  A lousy planet (one without Food bonuses) shouldn't be able to support large populations.  And the Food Distribution Center solves the problem a little.  But I'd rather see the FDC as a very early or stand-alone tech (or perhaps dependent on Basic Logistics) - again, for customizing worlds without having to deal with the auto-upgrades a new farm tech generates.  (I keep my populations very controlled to keep morale way up.)

I do not like the icon for Discovery Sphere.  The black sphere (now used for Invention Matrix) is perfect and fits the description.   I never have liked the blue(purple?) half sphere originally used for Invention Matrix, but everyone is used to it.  So why not go back to the black angular building for Research Academy?  Or is that being used for something alien? 

Hmm.  Maybe if you shrink the big red ball (current Discovery Sphere) image down and mute the color, it would serve as Invention Matrix.  The shape is kinda what I came up with just from brainstorming - structural and half-way toward a sphere.

Individual weapons illustrations is nice, and I appreciate the effort.  But they don't make much difference to me.  Most of my battles I bail out early when the outcome becomes obvious.  Different color shields is a really nice touch, though.  As is different audio.

Do you notice a slow-down in FPS during battle now?  Mine is a little choppy.  But it could be my machine - I've been having trouble with the video.  The driver crashes in odd and mysterious ways.  Yet in the meantime it performs okay.  Tough to blame the chop on it.

Say, I'm using the 64-bit Notepad++ and it's got this really annoying autocomplete type-along popup.  Do you know how to turn it off?

I'm going to have to go back to 32-bit because I really need a spell-checker.  My editor eye is seriously handicapped by the confusion of XML.  (And this time leave the tabs in.)

That way I could split it away from more unsuitable factions, plus make it more a middle/lategame technology. Otherwise the situation could arise when a player gets to research an Invasion-technique having not even Planetary Invasion at hand.

TBH the design of the current farming layout is mostly based on AI gameplay. I studied this extensively, perhaps one of my strongest regions in the game. The 1PP approach is crucial because it prevents the AI from having multiple farms at one planet. And using multiple farming bonus-tiles.

This is abuseable. If you then just trade the last farming technologies to them, after some time you'll see quite some planets with populations well beyond 18b but moral in the red. If you attack using Information Warfare you can scoop up 6b soldiers and will successfully invade this planet, on first try. Sometimes your remaining soldier's number will even be higher than before the attack, then these survivors transfer to the planet's population and also one full crew of the vanishing transport-vessel. Newly conquered planet hits turn with ~2000 pop already in positive economic balance. That's overpowered and the reason why IW got nerfed in the CU, plus all moral buildings can't have spies anymore.

In FW this can only happen on planets with food-bonustiles, in the CU, this can happen on all planets beyond PQ>7.

Nevertheless, I think farming in FW is still quite elegant for the player. First, you already start out with the basic farm. This generates a more homogenous farming-distribution for the AI game. A player can also include it in his Planetary Governor - standard templates and use it already in the colonial rush. Much less work later once planets become crowded. And if you rely on the auto-upgrade feature, you can simply control the amount of available food with the research of a technology.

The reason why the FDC (or FDS) is middly-placed is that its bonus works percentage-wise so an early placement on a 8p or 10p planet would only generate an extra +2mt food - something that is equally achieved by the next tiered Xeno Farm as well - just much better because no extra tile is needed and far less buildcosts.

Why? This icon seems more massive and energetic to me. If you take a look at all the laboraties or research facility icons throughout the game you'll recognize some similarities: they're mostly blueish, occupied with astronomical work (satellite dishes aimed towards the sky, or gleaming experimental constructs inside showing planetary charta and so on...) and some upgrade into the other always getting bigger.

The upgrade of the Xeno Lab into the Research Center seems obvious to me. The upgrade of the Research Center into the Research Academy not so much - but there was a technological development ongoing during the research of the RCC leading to the "Adv. Labs"-tier.

The upgrade of the Research Academy into the Invention Matrix seems also obvious to me. The Research Academy is simply half the ball your see when looking at the Invention Matrix. The upgrade of the Invention Matrix into the Discovery Sphere not so much, but the is also another technology in beetween and I simply don't see how it could pssibly work the other way around...

If descriptions are non-fitting to your eye, simply change them. Most of the time I wasn't paying too much heed to the generic descriptions, only to hint at special concepts did I use these to explain certain things.

This icon is used for the Altarian's Dark Energy Weapons lab exclusively. It correlates to the blueish version which is the Discovery Sphere. The DEWL is also quite potent structure so it makes sense to have it look similar to the top notch lab.

That's due to the mod. FW demands much more RAM due to increased image sizes due to better quality but also diameter. Before the last before latest update I went through all graphics and compressed them further when it was possible w/o loosing lots of quality. That's why the new release didn't increase in size. I'm afraid that's all I can do.  

Yeah I need to remedy that, hope I can find the original template.

I like this. This change has happened when I redistributed all the ethical technologies. Some of them were in a strange placement even in the original game.

Cost & effect yes, but not a shippart or building.

Yes, the game is a bit more territorial and the research into range not so trivial. Even the smallest possible range-mod is still OP and guarantees you to fly everywhere.

I would like the name "Co-Propulsion Auxiliary vessel" much better than Magic Carpet. That sounds fantasy-like and would only be fitting to Altarians. This vessel does have hardpoints and except a Warp Bubble Projector should carry engines or sensors. In GC2 the logistics ability relates to computing strength because that is much needed when simulating multiple ships forming a fleet. So from my pointof view, that vessel must carry some special computers & coordination system, most likely also commanding officers of the highest hierarchy. That's why it has no logistical requirements because it can do this work on its own. And that's also the connection with the logistic branch. Someone researching into logistics may find such a ship handy. Only very few civs have actually access to Warp Bubbles, I think only Humans and Minors. And the Minors don't need it at all so that would be a major setback.

I'm sorry but I can't follow you here. These buildings are designed to illustrate how slaves/clones can be turned into production or food. They are never ment to be a population enhancers. The technology Wretched Cloning does this as base. The AUL Incinerator acts as an upgrade to the Death Furnace so the total loss of population growth is only -20%.

If you research down this branch completely and build all its improvements then the total planetary loss/gain will be as follows:

+9mt food

+101% production

-20% pop growth

- 3 tiles

+ 9bcs maint

If a planet is still growing in population you could choose to delay to build the Wretched Harvestor. Once full population has been reached, a population growth penalty becomes irrelevant. More production is always welcome. Maybe some of the old descriptions are misleading, but one peek over how the buildings work and the bonuses they bring must incite you to errect the AUL Inc always - this is one of the strongest buildings ingame! The strongest farm + strongest production enhancer combined into a single building (that's why it can suffer -1 tile and still be very viable).

Hey what's PG?

Yeah that would be fine.

As to the other points raised, there is a difference. First off, I need to say that the way I think about the Command Hull as something that already ingraines lots of computation. That's why it can have no logistical requirements and that's perhaps also the reason why it is so expensive & fragile. I want that hull to be available to all -or most- factions. If I attach it to Warp Bubbles then I should make Warp Bubbles available to anyone which will somewhat impact the Krynn's Hasty Fleet specialization as well take one reason as to why let Minors alive, away.

This hull can have other uses. Once +85 miniaturization is reached (the base included in any techtree as minimum...) you can attach a single Adv. Troops Module to it and use it to invade planets. Expensive but without any limitations on your attacking troops' number. These ships can also savely accompany the main warfleets which is normally used to clear out defenders. Because it is unarmed, you don't have to remove it from the fleet prior to the engagement, because it will be placed at the end of the list and thus, only suffer an attack if you loose that battle. This way your troop ships are more safe plus.

Another usage would be to arm that ship with a single high-end weapon and then put some defensive mods on it. If you include it now into an all-attack designed warfleet, the combat calculator will also place it at the end of the list so its fragility won't matter. This is especially effective once you reach the top tiered weapons/defenses because these mods are usually so expensive that the expensive base-costs of this hull become relatively less of a problem, because these ships costs around 500 to 1000 MP in total. A good specialized production world can release such a ship every turn. Thus you can add a good amount of extra firepower to any fleet. In the beginning this basically will just be a gimmick but if you handle your battles alright then the number of these ships will rise over time increasing the attack of your fleet into regions not possible with other methods. They can make a large difference in if you win a battle or not.

Finally, if you combine this approach with the Super Warrior-ability (were enemy fleets won't fire back if destroyed with the opening volley) you can stuff this hull full of weapons and add large portions of extra firepower to your best fleet. Which will then win any battle losslessly. Image a customed-Yor with their immense miniaturization-bonuses doing that, even without the Technological Victory bonuses such a vessel could bring a base of +144 attack to the table. That is gamedeciding, but I think it's okay because it needs alot of ramp up time and only becomes feasable very late. But I didn't wanna hint at it with template.

Lastly some of the fleet-enhancing mods will come back at some time and then this ship may be a suitable vessel to carry those. I did throw all these mods (Kill Zone Computers etc) out of the game because you can use them to manipulate the target-rational of the battle-sequencer. And that the AI won't use them. But I've done some experiments in the past and maybe I can remedy that with some unorthodox usage of code.

This way I tell a player to make himself on the lookout to catch the Warp Bubble technology via trade or stealing, either the Humans research it or maybe you can protect a Minor civ or steal Hasty Fleets from Krynn. Many of the templates are there to hint at potential ideas (like "Jumper"-ships...). Or use that ship in another way (s.o.) and if all things fall short then, at least, that tech will let you build the HLS. So, however it comes to research this technology isn't useless.

Maybe we could invent just another special hull and have that designed to accomodate Bubble-ships, and then attribute it the Bubble-techs. And change the Command Hull to be a bit more suitable for combat purposes.

I've cut down the Yor's racial loyalty to 50% but distributed the other half into the techtree. This way a Custom Race using the Yor tree does still have access to some loyalty. In the original game you're screwed as a custom race since you neither get influence or loyalty.

A 100% loyalty doesn't give you a guarantee just diminishes the chances of flipping. Only the rack does this, and I see the combination of both as a the result of an ongoing endeavour of this civ to entirely negate foreign influences. If Yor colonize or capture a low PQ planet inside a system were filled-up planets of other neutral factions are present, then the 100% loyalty will buy enough time to build the rack if a red face should show up.

Individual Yor are not immortal. The Spark of Life fades over time, which is something the Collective itselve doesn't understand because it's been the Arnor/Dread Lords who imbued them with this power.

It adds +18 TP so is one of the strongest labs ingame. And let's not argue semantics here. Did you notice that Yor have no spamable labs and so have only 3*1pp structures which will add research. The only way for Yor to increase their research is by building more factories. This is already a super-hard approach to research but if you replace that with moral or loyalty (which would be irrelevant because the Rack already prevents rebellion 100%) then Yor would only have 2 labs and actually that would screw the whole approach. The way I see the Rack is more like a planetary firewall. The Stalks give the Yor a better morale because the structures are described to boost the Spark of Life from its original source.

Hmm?  I built a custom race from Yor based on the aforementioned game and it seemed to work just fine.

The immortality comment was in regards to that game, not this one. ( I always wanted the GMs to introduce some form of mortality, but they never did.)  AIS (BSE robot race) Citizens were built in factories using rare materials, but I doubt that would translate to GC.   One thing that might, though -- Citizens didn't need life support on ships or most ground installations, but didn't like corrosive atmospheres.  Is it possible to prevent Yor from colonizing Toxic (or maybe Radioactive) worlds?  Maybe be set to require ImpossibleTech in Yor_Techtree?

As I say, I haven't played a full game with your Yor yet, but made un-spyable and un-influenceable, coupled with that movement nerf, I would venture that they'll be a PITA to deal with.

Does the Korx Zone Extension Module also increase the distance at which the starbase can boost planetary production?

<StarbaseAbility>StarbaseRange</StarbaseAbility>
<StarbaseAbilityValue>5</StarbaseAbilityValue>

BTW.  The description of SuperTradeStarbases says that it doubles income.  Yet this:

<StarbaseAbility>Trade</StarbaseAbility>
<StarbaseAbilityValue>50</StarbaseAbilityValue>

Doesn't that mean that it increases income by 50%?

Thalan StellarProduction enables a 1PP Economic Direction Unit.  But on the build menu is that unit, and a second EDU that is not 1PP.  In other words, I could build an all-EDU world.

Please take a look at it.

P.S. I built EDU1 on Thala, then used <ctrl-shift-R> to enable all techs for the test, so maybe another tech is involved.

I've started work on PlanetImprovements, so if you change it, please send just the changed part.  (Do you still have my email address?)

Later:  I walked through the build using <ctrl-R> and it works okay, with two caveats. 1) the "upgrade" on the home world was unexpected, but I see why it's necessary. 2) if the Super project isn't built before EDU2 becomes available, it won't be (no loss).

If you get the StellarProduction tech before EDU1 is built it is hidden by EDU2 (didn't look in the old tech folder for EDU1).

Was not able to reproduce the "unlimited" EDU with just <ctrl-R>.  You judge whether it's worth pursuing.

Well that explains it, except that I thought <ctrl-shift-R> does not complete Tech. Vic. 

Okay, I got another problem.  Arceaen speed buffs are over the top.  Their ships have historically been a little slow but very tough.  In FW, they remain tough, but in mid-game they would seem to be the fastest around.

From the start, Arc. have a string of 6 techs, each of which provides a speed boost. Six techs, +6 speed.

In contrast, Terrans - the speed merchants - must go through 3 engine techs before they can research the 3 speed tech, then are locked out of speed until they research ALL the rest of the engine techs. Six techs, +3 speed

Granting that Arc. has to use a tile to build a Nav. Center, they have Weather Control - +2 or 3 tiles.  The Terran doesn't.

Plus you've made the Nav. Center techs untradeable (which I don't disagree with in principle), yet Arc. can easily acquire all the other speed techs.

Don't you see something wrong there? 

 I would suggest, at the least, dropping the Slipstream II tech from his tree and making Slip I more costly.  The Superior Nav. Center makes good sense if there's a Slip tech to justify it.  But maybe the streams just aren't so easy for the Arc. navigators to deal with.

There's something going on with Extreme World techs. 

In a test game using your previous version, Iconian has Toxic. It does not show on his trade screen.

Korath (who has Adv.Toxic as a racial) also has Toxic, though he did not research it. It does not show on his trade screen.

No one else has Toxic, so how did Ico and Kor get it??

Why do Iconian Aqu. and Toxic techs not require Extreme Colonization? 

How did Ico. research the base techs without their prerequisites?  (Ico does not have Extreme Col.)

Why do Yor and Korath have the Advanced extreme techs as racials, but not the base techs?

Are all racial techs Untradable?

Strange occurrence: Terran completed Int.Govts. and got Political Cap.  It showed up with the label "Technological Capital" in the build tree (w/ the PolCap icon and description).  A restart cured it.  I see nothing wrong in the files.

I can't find any attribute that designates a ship component as "one per ship".  Nothing in Cari's Guide or the wiki.  I don't see anything in GC2Types that do it, e.g. on Righteous Might. 

??

I can explain that decision. In most testgames Arceans weren't doing quite well, the initial speed penalty has a severe effect on the number of colonies gathered in the colonial rush - and that was almost always a game-deciding loss. I had to boost them here, also because their SA only works if they initial the combat (offensive attack) which, esp. lategame with hightiered weapons, can result in lossless oneshotkill-battle.

The Terran do get much more basespeed once they go down for technological victory. The Terrans also have one of the best research capabilities and are funded, good diplomatics, in most testgames strong. The Arceans do get penalized on tech-development and are designed to have only *late*game-strength.