Is this more like MOO1?

[Father Beast]

I'm just a newbie to this forum, I haven't given MOO3 a chance because of 2 reasons:
1. moo2 sucked so bad it left a horrible taste in my mouth. uninstalled.
2. the first thing I heard about this game, the IFP, sounded really stupid.

But I still play MOO. My main complaints in the transition to moo2 were:
1. moving people around categories instead of sliders.
2. only being able to research one thing at a time, instead of MOO's multiple tech trees.
3. the awful system of command points that limited your shipbuilding and rewarded those who built a few large ships over those who built a lot of small ships.

anyway....

Then, just out of curiousity, I looked at the latest screenshots. what did I see? SLIDERS!?!?!

does this mean that Moo3 is finally getting back to its roots? or is that an anomaly and it's actually a lot more like moo2?

[Stormhound]

To tell you the truth, I've played MOO more recently than MOO2 myself.

We did go back and look at things from both MOO and MOO2 that worked well, and tried to take some of the best from both games while adding a lot of new things on our own.

1. No more moving people around. Both sliders AND build queues are used.

2. You can research as many different fields and applications as you wish. It's up to you how thinly you wish to spread your research budget. And the tech "tree" is a lot bigger to boot.

3. No command points; ships require maintenance, though, and more so when they're on active duty.

So far as IFP, there's been some talk about it over here, and lots more over on the Delphi forum. Some people don't like it, but more seem to than not, and they're definitely here to stay and not an optional part of the game. I personally thought they were a great idea the first time I got to read the design doc; they promote strategy over micromanagement, and they help give smaller empires a better time against large ones.

[Thue]

IFPs are definently a very elegant solution to micromanagement-hell and as a disadvantage for big empires, all in one stroke.

[Stormhound]

Thanks. I should point out that having a bigger empire does NOT get you any more IFP in MOO3, which is how the balance between smaller and larger empires is made...I don't think I had mentioned that over here before.

[Father Beast]

Originally posted by Stormhound
To tell you the truth, I've played MOO more recently than MOO2 myself.

We did go back and look at things from both MOO and MOO2 that worked well, and tried to take some of the best from both games while adding a lot of new things on our own.

1. No more moving people around. Both sliders AND build queues are used.

2. You can research as many different fields and applications as you wish. It's up to you how thinly you wish to spread your research budget. And the tech "tree" is a lot bigger to boot.

3. No command points; ships require maintenance, though, and more so when they're on active duty.

So far as IFP, there's been some talk about it over here, and lots more over on the Delphi forum. Some people don't like it, but more seem to than not, and they're definitely here to stay and not an optional part of the game. I personally thought they were a great idea the first time I got to read the design doc; they promote strategy over micromanagement, and they help give smaller empires a better time against large ones.

Hmmnnn... point 1,2, and 3 have been addressed. I recall that ships required maintenance in MOO as well. bigger ships required more, of course.

In that case, I may be willing to give IFP a second look. I'll take some time over the next little while and look at the Moo3 site. This game may have some promise after all.

[Stormhound]

Yep, they did require maintenance in MOO, but you didn't have the option of building both an "active duty" and a "reserve" fleet, so you had to pay full maintenance all the time.

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Thue
IFPs are definently a very elegant solution to micromanagement-hell and as a disadvantage for big empires, all in one stroke.

AND they are REALISTIC! Praise to the guy who thought of the IFP system!