Review-in-Progress (Open Thread)

[Solver]

Hm, what is what Yin described call then? I also (sometimes) do that, and think of that as roleplaying...

[yin26]

"In role-playing, participants adopt characters, or parts, that have personalities, motivations, and backgrounds different from their own. Role-playing is like being in an improvisational drama or free-form theatre, in which the participants are the actors who are playing parts."

Intersting distinction. Thank you.

The character (or part) of leader of the human race is different from who I am. Check.

The personality is mine. No check.

The motivations relate to being a ruler of the world, which I'm not, but I try to make the decisions based on what my real motives might be. Tie.

Background is certainly not mine. Check.

So, only my personality is not role-playing. The rest either is or it's a grey area. Thus, I'm voting that I am role-playing with a preference for carrying my personality in to the game as much as possible. That sounds about right.

[Solver]

An interesting bit: GalCiv2's just out, and this thread has more replies than any thread about GalCiv1 ever had.

I'm soon joining you with hopefully insightfull comments .

[Sirian]

Originally posted by Solver
An interesting bit: GalCiv2's just out, and this thread has more replies than any thread about GalCiv1 ever had.

Yes but we all know that I can bloviate thousands of words at a time to no useful end, so you should pro-rate that measurement.

I wasn't visiting Poly (or CFC) much while playing GC1. I was hiding out in RB land.


- Sirian

[bonscott]

Hey Solver, looks like a Demo is going to QA this week so if you can't get the game for a while the Demo may be out by the end of the month.

[yin26]

Brad hates demos, though. So just buy the game (you can download it at Stardock) and don't insult the developer. That is all.

[Solver]

Hey Solver, looks like a Demo is going to QA this week

Too late . Yin got me. Already reading the manual right now. Yin, I'll send you the bill later this evening .

[yin26]

Hey, if I win a copy of the game (the galaxy is listening, after all), I'll e-Bay it...and I'll give you 10% for every awesome (but doable) idea you have for the game. Now, c'mon, you can come up with 10 awesome (but doable) ideas in your sleep. If _you_ win a copy, you'll still hand over the entire amount to me and get cracking on those 10 ideas. Sounds good, right?

Seriously, you're getting the game is fantastic news. Between you and Sirian here, this is promising to be a stellar (get it? stellar? like in it's a space game?) discussion. Sorry for the pun. I just had a strong coffee and lost my mind a moment.

[Solver]

I can't win a copy, I'm a staff member .

First impression of GalCiv2: nicely written manual - a slightly humorous style. Same goes for the readme file. The leaderheads/animations for the alien races are horrible. I hate most visual designs for aliens that games/movies come up - particuarly the various sentient aliens. Loved the design of SMAC Progenitors though.

The political party system and the Senate seem interesting. Hmm.

[yin26]

Look at that. Solver has already consumed the manual. Stand back, people. We don't know how big Solver's review could get!

[Solver]

I've actually got 10 pages to go and I skimmed through the beggining parts .

I will, instead of a review, probably have a stream of thoughts coming in and changing somewhat, instead of what I did with Civ4. By the time I (p)reviewed Civ4, I had played the game for several months, after all. Here, I may be making a real first impression post in a few hours, and then adding my musings as I play.

[Solver]

OK, a question. I can equip my Starbases with defensive or attacking modules. Starbases are like tile improvements in Civ, stationary stuff. I can see the point of defensive modules, but what would an attacking module on a Starbase do?

[yin26]

Sweet! As you know, I opted for a more "organic" review process, too, and I think it's been great getting the community here voicing thoughts. Really looking forward to yours.

[bonscott]

Originally posted by Solver
OK, a question. I can equip my Starbases with defensive or attacking modules. Starbases are like tile improvements in Civ, stationary stuff. I can see the point of defensive modules, but what would an attacking module on a Starbase do?

There are a couple things you can do here.

Any of the non-military starbases can have starbase attack and defenese modules attached. These are offense and defense. The way GalCiv2 works is that a given defense effects how much damage you avoid (think of armor in a role playing game, a sword causes 12 damage but your armor absorbed 8 of it). So if your enemy has beam weapons then you can equip the +5 beam defense to deflect beam damage.

BUT eventually the enemy will destroy your starbase because it can't do any damage back. Thus the starbase can be given attacking modules such as the devastation beam (beam +7) so it will then attack as a ship does. Think Babylon 5 station or DS9 having weapons to fight back.

Now pure military starbases give you the ability to also add "assist" modules. Thus if you add a module that give a +3 missle attack assist, all ships in range of the starbase will get an extra +3 missle attack bonus (think Babylon 5 when the attackers get close enough the starbase can coordinate with the ships in attacking). Same for a defensive assist, a +3 beam defense assist gives all ships in range a +3 beam defense bonus. The one thing is to receive theses assist boni the ship must have at least 1 in that category already. So to receive a defense assist bonus the ship must have at least 1 defense itself *in any category*. Basically when I assemble fleets I always make sure at least one ship in the fleet has it's own defense bonus. AND every ship, even a purely defensive one, should have at least 1 attack in something so that it can not only defend itself/fight back but be able to get starbase attack assist.

Whew that was long!

[yin26]

Man, great answer. Makes me think more carefully about my starbases...