I thought I make up a new thread for all balancing remarks and in-game experiences from your side so if you have found something in the game that needs to be amended with regards to the balancing (i.e. ship costs, combat outcomes, building time, etc.) report it in, scav's looking forward to get some feedback on those issues.

As an aid for me to experiment with balance issues is there anything that we can do to enable me to control more than one empire from the same PC. [I.E. hot-seat instead of IP play]

If, from the same PC, I could control multiple empires I could of course play them and see if I noticed anything that seemed terribly out-of-whack.

that's a good one. I think sir p. does this kind of testing with his developer version. He just copies the bote.exe into another folder and starts two instances of the game and so has multiplayer-mode on one pc (switching via alt+tab on the keyboard). Don't know if that's possible with the alpha2 cause you need an ip and I don't know if the program can handle two identical ip's. Maybe try and check it out.

Otherwise you could just plug a second pc on, but well it has to have the same "big" monitor screen so a notebook wouldn't be enough there..

I think, there's not much one can do to test it out on your own besides getting another somewhat identical pc in your room which is kinda "unhandy" I'm afraid..

Note: I'm only asking because I'd like to help

My main PC has OODDLES [4GB] of memory so if I can run 2 versions of the alpha that sounds like the way to go. I'll try it later tonight and let you know if that works.

If that doesn't work I was planning on using my main PC & laptop but I was hoping that I wouldn't have to burn the extra electricity to do that

FYI: I've done some testing on a laptop with a max screen res of 1024x768 and I'm getting by OK. I wouldn't want to manage a whole galaxy this way but it is dooable [at least with my laptop].

glad to hear.

of course i wasn't assuming something different than what you stated in your first line

well, I'm lookin forward seein some feedback from you. Feel free to give us any critic you want

Of course you can play multiplayer with one pc. You only have to start a BotE-server. Than you can start the BotE-exe again and you can join your own game. You can search your game in the local area network, too. If you joined your game, the server instance of BotE has to start it. Than you can switch with alt+tab through the different instances of BotE. It is similar to a hot-seat session.

ha! I knew it

I've been playing around with my first hotseat game and I don't have firm conclusions but I do have some observations:

1. I think that some tweaks to the "random" layout of the galaxy should be done in later revisions. Basically in my last game the CoPs had a great layout while the Rotharians were really put behind the 8-ball.

It might not be a bad idea to randomly generate some planets around one faction and then repeat a similar template for the other factions so one empire doesn't have a significantly better starting position than the others.

2. Minors that join your empire need to be guaranteed to be at least somewhat self-sufficient. I've had several minors join me with level 3 or 4 tech but no farms, industries, or mines.

As far as the game itself the Coalitiion's good starting position, favorable minors, and trade centers have put them way ahead at this point.

I'll have to play tons of games though before I get a feel of how much of it is random luck and how much is balance related.

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Has anyone else had similar experiences?

1: Later I will rework the galaxy generation, so you get different galaxy types (spiral, random...). Now unfortunately a race sometimes has an advantage.

2: That's okay so. Minorraces have special abilities. So sometimes a minorrace has a lot of industry but no research buildings. Sometimes a minorrace has a lot of farms, but no mines. Generally a minorrace has some farms. Sometimes there aren't enough farms for the current population, than the system has more other buildings. It won't happen, that you get a system without any building except you bomb before.

No problem man. This is an alpha and it's easily the best "alpha" that I've ever seen.



IIRC I had one minor [of decent population] join me with one or two L3 farms. In addition they didn't have any industry or mines at all so not only did I have to "buy" farms I also had to "trade" for the resources ...

I think I have a save-game from about that time so I'll load it to make sure what's going on.

I think that it might make for a better experience for the minors to at least be able to feed themselves. After that point it probably wouldn't matter too much if they had "too many of this building" or "too few of that other building".

BTW: I love the fact now that minors can build Intel buildings. This is a very nice, and needed, addition IMHO.

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Here is an idea that is either elegant or terrible depending on your POV.

I'm pretty sure that when an AI is released there will be a part of the AI dedicated to managing how major powers develope their planets.

Maybe during the human's turn we could have an AI running that, in addition to making plans for AI major powers, also helps the minor powers run their planets.

At the start of the game the main game should decide the initial population, number and types of buildings, etc.. From here the race should develope in a reasonably organic way ....

There would be no AI for the minorrace. At the moment the buildings on a minorrace system are build, if you get the system. So there are no calculations about foodproduction or something else before anybody ownes this system. But I can change the algorithm a little bit, so there are more farms in the system.

If there won't be an AI that dictates how a minor grows then will whatever process we end up with be moddable? Even something like a simple table lookup where we can tweak the numbers ourselves would be nice ....

If I understood that right, the concept is the following:

we got all minors divided into subgroups, each of them linked to the current main tech level of all majors (the subgroups are shown in the MinorsDiploAnswers.data (financial, warlike, farmer, industrial, researcher,..).

According to these values, the minor will get his tech level from the current mean tech, so there'll be no AI needed there. (this might also be the problem that you experienced with the minors having no buildings or low tech cause the other majors obviously suck having no AI in the alpha2-version hehe ). Only thing you can mod is the subgroup membership of the specific minor race so that it gets a little more tech like the researcher subgroup. But those ones won't get that many ships as the warlike for example so be careful with that of course .

Only thing that is needed for a minor is a ship movement and strategic fleet placement AI so that the vulcans for example can explore the galaxy a bit and the tarokians defend their territory properly as well as the Sevar attack all their enemies (meaning the rest of the galaxy ).

btw. "extreme" minor races definitely need some sort of special treatment..

Actually I have no problem with the minor's tech levels as they seem to almost always be at my level or above.

For example [IIRC] the Hungoma and the Tuc had buildings of level 6 across the board when they became members and the most advanced tech race that I controlled was at tech 5 across the board with tech 3&4 buildings.




I'm not worried too much about research per-se. I'd just like to see a better balance of buildings so that when I took over the minor power they could contribute in a meaningful way.

I've had 2 cases [out of 3] where an early joining minor was so messed up that it took the combined economic output of my empire to save them from starvation. IIRC one minor was in a famine state for a LONG time while I managed to feed another minor with about 10 or so food units left over in storage

FYI: In the 3rd case I am more-or-less giving up on the minor because they had lots of high tech buildings but no way to actually improve themselves over time without huge expenditures from my own empire. [Lots of high tech buildings with 4 industries and a couple of Titan mines]



I agree. The thing is I think almost every race is extreme in one way or another so I think they all need to be treated with special care.

For example I don't see Riejsa as being big into mines / industry / etc. I do see them having one HECK of a special building for Tourism though that more than makes up for not having anything else.

The Hungoma probably shouldn't even need food as they should be happy munching away on the planet's natural resources.

I'm sure there are tons of other possible "extreme" cases ...

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Maybe if we can't have a table that makes modding easy then maybe just have the minor race "overbuild" all building and then the player's decision is more along the lines of what buildings to scrap then what buildings they "have" to build to get the minor to contribute meaningfully.

Not every time. I think you shouldn't take a minorrace early in the game. If you wait till the population has reached the maximum, you get more buildings in the system. It is a strategic way you have to choose. You can take a minorrace early with the risk there are only less buildings. But you get the race and not anybody of your enemies. But if you wait, you get a better system. That would be an advantage for the rest of the game.


Good idea, but it would be very complex to implement. So first I have to say this feature won't be implemented next time.


No. I don't like this idea, because the whole concept of the game will change.

My thoughts are that there should be both pros and cons for taking a minor race early in the game [say around turn 50-75] or later in the game [say around turn 200].

The pros of taking a minor late in the game are obvious. They are likely to have more buildings that are at a higher tech level. Once the minors have the ability to terraform their own planets, make their own fleets, maybe colonize other planets [Vulcans?] you'll get a lot of free bonuses when they do join you.

However there is currently [almost] 0 upside of taking a minor race early in the game [say around turn 50-75]. Even if the race is at full population they aren't likely to have enough buildings to feed themselves ; or have enough industry to upgrade buildings ; or have enough mines to supply raw materials. You actually lose money when they become members because you lose the trade routes that you had established. The only possible upside that I see is that you might get a minor with a lot of research and they could help you advance more quickly but that's an extreme longshot.

Because the decision is so easy [that you should take a minor later] this IMHO reduces the strategy component because there's not really any real decision to make.




I can't blame you there. There is waaayyyy too much work involved with this step until far later. I.E. this may be a good "1.1" version release instead of a 0.46 version



All I'm hoping for is something that can be modded easily enough should others that want to play decide that they'd like to tweak the buildings you get when a minor joins you.

If it matters I don't like the "overbuild" option either but that is better for gameplay than having the minor dramatically underbuild.

The number of buildings on a minorracesystem depends on the population, not on the techlevels. So you get the same number, if you take the minorrace late. Only the buildings have a higher techlevel, but the number of buildings is almost the same.

So if you take a minor with only 10mio population you will get a less number of buildings. You get about as much buildings as there is population on the system. E.g. for 10mio you get about 10 buildings. What buildings the minorrace has depends on their subgroup. But I can change the algorithm a little bit, so you get more buildings in systems with less population.

Thanks for the time spent on your replies. I know I've been a pest.

No no...

I like your feedback and we need it to make BotE better.

This MIGHT be a balance issue but I'm not sure. Of course it also doesn't matter at this point either ... but ...

I was testing as the Rotharians. I had a scout ship exploring the frontier and I found the Khaoron homeworld. The Khaorons killed the scout I assume with their scout and an armed colony ship.

I found the Heyoun homeworld in a prior game and won that combat so I assumed this wasn't really a big deal.

My top level rotharian ship at the time was some misc. destroyer. I went into Research -> Ship Design and maxed out weapons & shields. The only thing that I didn't max out was hull material and hull type which I left at defaults thinking that I wouldn't need to bother.

To make a long story short I made 2 of my top end destroyers, formed a task force, cloaked them, made sure they had attack orders, then sent them to the Khaoron homeworld.

They were defeated again.

I would assume that 2 maxed out destroyers SHOULD have been able to beat the Khaoron starting forces but they lost. Is there something that I overlooked? I assume that the Khaorons can't make more ships nor could they upgrade the ships they have .....

Lol...

There is a huge Khaoron armada stationed in the Khaoron homeworld. Most of their ships are cloaked, so you can't see them. But there are a lot of Dreadnought-class ships. These ships are techlevel 10 ships. To defeat this Khaoron fleet you need much more than two destroyers.

It is like a goal to defeat the Khaoron fleet in this alpha version. Try it

guess whose idea this was...

I guess that's something in the "I overlooked it" category ... heh

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OFFTOPIC: I listed 2 bugs in the bug report thread. I thought the klingon thing might be a bug. There is another POSSIBLE bug though at the end of my post about research .....

Rotharian Outposts feel a little weak to me. IIRC a Montgomery is a tech 4 starship [maybe tech 5]. If it is a tech 4 starship then the outpost seems a little weak to me when such a low tech starship can defeat it with minimal damage taken.

I suspect this is intentional but what is the reasoning behind it? Basically is the game designed where an outpost/starbase isn't strong unless also defended by ships?

That is a balancing issue. I want the outposts to be stronger too. But at the moment we have less feedback about shipbalancing, including stations and outposts, too. I think we need some time to find the right values for every ship. Scav (our shiplist creator) is doing a hard work.

If you want, you can modify it by your own. Download the shipeditor and you can change some values. If you want, you can post your modified shiplist as an attachement in the modification part of our german forum (or here).

I was thinking of doing the same thing but I have to play through a lot longer before I get a better feel for balance. In addition I'm not even sure that I have enough knowledge to know how things are supposed to work yet.

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How much of an obstacle do we want outposts and starbases to be? Should they be considered more "speed bumps" or "fortresses"? Are these objects upgradeable? [Like Outpost 1&2 or Starbase 1&2 in the original BotF] Should these installations be like artillery .. I.E. they can do huge damage and are possibly tough IF they have guards [like ships] but are easily overrun without those guards?

What do you guys think?

My guess would be is that outposts should be significant obstacles at tech levels 1-3 by themselves. Above that a couple of "tech level 4" ships should probably be able to take one out without having to worry about it. I'm thinking that outposts should be tech level 1.

My guess would be that starbases should be significant obstacles at tech levels 1-6. After that three or so tech level 7 ships should be able to take out a starbase. I'm thinking that Starbases should be tech level 4.

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In the future [not soon] I'll play around with the editors and see what I can come up with.

IIRC there are 8 cloaked scouts [speed bumps], 8 cloaked heavy cruiser class ships [nice ships], and 8 cloaked dreadnought type ships[beasts]. I assume all ships were green ... see reasoning below.

When I hit them I went in with a Coalition fleet of:
1 tech 3 cruiser class ship [2nd era]
6 tech 4 cruiser class ships [2nd era]
5 tech 5 cruiser class ships [3rd era]

The thing that surprises me is that I won and only lost the Montgomery class and two of the other cruiser class ships.

I imagine training plays a HUGE part and the power of the cloak has gone way down.

What are the "formulas" for how training & cloaking work now?

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For the next alpha maybe the Omega Alliance should have a tech superior fleet with high experience? ... heh

What, that suprised me. I needed over 40 ships to destroy the klingon fleet.


Training is very important. Cloak isn't so strong like in the original Botf. You don't get a free turn. With good scanners, you can attack cloaked ships in the first round to. After one shot of a cloaked ship, this ship isn't cloaked anymore. So the other ships can attack this ship immediately.

But I don't want to tell everything about the exact formulas and algorithms.

I believe the key was that I had trained my ships for a while. I don't know the XP needed in BotE for ships to become "Legendary" but I suspect that most of my ships were Legendery when I attacked. I also did some special research projects along the way that I'm sure helped.

I understand that you don't want to give out the exact combat and/or cloaking formulas. Would you mind giving out the training formulas and XP amounts required to hit each level [assuming that you have discrete levels that is...]

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EDIT: I think I got the tech levels of the ships wrong. I suspect that I was one tech level low on the above.

I.E. The Montgomery class ships were tech 4 or so ; the weaker ships were tech 5 or so ; the other stronger class ships were tech 6 or so ... With better techs come better shield and weapon systems if the ship designer is used.

Has anyone looked into ship balancing with the Rotharians?

While I haven't really done ANY real testing it seems like the Rotharians have an ENORMOUS advantage by having their special building that produces 2 Deritium per turn.

With ships having large resource costs in Deritium it's obviously advantageous to any race to be able to create more than double the dilithium that other races can.