Searching the Fungus for a game

[uss1701jb]

Nope. Lal is a doctor, so that's one. Two is the whole -efficiency, then there's the double votes. I feel he is overpowered, and to top it of, there's the Han complex story. Shudder.

I also think the Peacekeeping son-of-a thing is pretty funny.


I'll try the patch ASAP

[Kirov]

I get it. I like playing Lal, although I don't feel he's OP. His bonuses are nothing compared to Zak's or Yang's. And what's that Han complex story? I'm not sure I follow you here.

I PMed t_ras about the map. If he can't do that, there is no point in waiting for another CMN and I say screw it and let's play random. I know this can be really unfair to either player, so we can play two random games at once, and we can also restart if the starting location is imba (e.g. you got the Jungle, the Dunes, start next to the aliens etc.).

[ete]

Maybe consider trying the map described in this post: http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=4144.0 (scroll down for .pngs of the map)? It's designed for each player controlling 2-3  factions which would give a richer game, but could be played with one faction each if you want and I can CMN it. It's not particularly balanced with the Pirates in mind, but there's a few reasonable starting places for them which would be fitting, and their advantage of getting a ton of pods and probably the fertile continent should be partly outweighed by their allies being outnumbered on land.

That would give you a fair map.

If you want to play it, agree on any bonus starting units you want, how many factions to have each, and PM me which factions/starting positions (they are numbered landmarks on the map) you want.

[Kirov]

Thanks for the info and your offer. I'll wait for uss's opinion, but I do feel like playing an unknown map, you know, with exploration choices etc. Somehow I just don't have too much love for maps like the Vets. But I can concede.

Uss, what do you think about playing several factions at once? I have my objections and I've never played like this.

[ete]

That's fair, exploring random maps is always fun. I tried to give a bit of choice in places to explore, but it's never going to be the same if you have seen the area before. It could be played with just one faction each, and give more place to explore.

[uss1701jb]

Sorry for not getting back sooner. School has started again and I am only on a computer for 45 minutes before 12:00 PM Chicago time.

My Autocorrect changed Hab to Han. Sorry.

I do not wish to control more factions at once. I would be willing to use the map though.

[t_ras]

Ill be working on this during the coming weekend. regarding next Scient patch - we are waiting for the alatest version.

[Kirov]

USS, I'm off 1-8 September, so maybe we could wait for t_ras to find some more time?

The other option is that we can use ete's map. I really only glimpsed at it briefly and noticed like two wide continents, so if you do the same and nothing more, we can have a regular map with cool exploration and everything. What do you think?

I'm afraid we won't start any serious play until I come back.

[t_ras]

I think Ete's map is certainly interesting.

[uss1701jb]

Ete's map is fine.

[Kirov]

Ete's map is fine.

Did you just glimpse at it (like me) or take a closer look? Either way, let's not study it further and we're good to go.

So you say you take the Pirates? Fine, give me Miriam (dum-dum-dum-duuum!). I've played her like 3 times in my life, obviously never in MP, but it's time to try out this a gameplay.

I'm also fine with using 5 AIs, at the CMN's discretion. And you?

Remember, no crawlers and choppers allowed! Can you put it in the name of the game? Because I'm bound to forget it at some point.

Alternatively, I can try to provide an alphax.txt with those elements removed.

[uss1701jb]

5 is fine. ITS ALL FINE

[Yitzi]

As far as game breaking stuff is concerned, opinions differ greatly. Personally, I don't like EG, CBA and copters the most. I'd ban the first two and either ban or nerf copters (common approaches are restricting copters to low attack values or forbidding them from attacking base tiles).

If you're using my patch, you can also remove the bonus speed that copters get from reactors; together with boosting the AAA ability (which hurts copters more than needlejets because they lose their advantage if they take enough damage per attack that they can't safely attack twice in a turn), I suspect that will be a good nerf.

[t_ras]

Compters are fun part of the game, yet I recognise that if one of the players gets them much early then the others is it game beraking.Yitsi, is there a good way to keep everything and yet balance it somehow (is boosting AAA enough?)

[Yitzi]

Compters are fun part of the game, yet I recognise that if one of the players gets them much early then the others is it game beraking.Yitsi, is there a good way to keep everything and yet balance it somehow (is boosting AAA enough?)

I've never playtested this approach, but I would suggest:
-Switch Doctrine:Air Power from requiring Synthetic Fossil Fuels and Doctrine:Flex to Synthetic Fossil Fuels and AAA.  It'll delay it, and in particular puts AAA on the path to it.
-Lower the Air Superiority ability to Synthetic Fossil Fuels, to weaken needlejet blocking.
-Lower the cost of AAA from 1 to -1, and of Air Superiority from 1 to 0 but with the "cost increased for land units" flag set.
-For later in the game, disable Dissociative Wave for air units, and set Probability Mechanics to double the effectiveness of ECM and AAA.
-While that should weaken air power, and thus the Cloudbase Academy, there's still the satellite effect, so I'd suggest moving Orbital Defense Pod down to Orbital Space Flight and cutting its cost to 8 rows, and moving Sky Hydroponics Lab up to Super Tensile Solids and increasing its cost and that of Nessus Mining Stations to 18 rows.  That way, satellites are harder to build than to destroy, weakening them and hopefully finishing the balancing of CBA.
-For the Planetary Energy Grid, your best bet is probably to increase hurry costs across the board by 150% in order to weaken the value of energy credits and thereby help balance the PEG.

To repeat: I've never tested these, but I think they would improve balance in the areas you're concerned about.