GalCiv IV Dev Journal #4 - A Guided ALPHA Tour
For this entry, we are going to give you a tour of Galactic Civilizations IV as it exists, in alpha state, in June 2021. We’re very excited.
There’s a lot in here but so very much more to do.
Note: I’m playing at 5K so I’m smushing my screenshots down so that they’re not quite so huge.
Choosing a Civilization
For the Alpha, you can only play as the humans. This is because we intend to make the civilizations much more distinct than they were in GC3 which means we really need to master the humans and general mechanics before going through all the others.
We anticipate launching with around 22 civilizations. The main civs from GC3 will return with one notable exception: The Thalan. I will miss them as they’ve been with us all the way back to the OS/2 days.
Customizing
While you will be able to create your own civilizations in the final version, we have taken this one step further by having some easy customization part of the base civilization as well. One of the things we noticed in GC3 is that most players didn’t realize just how much you could change on a given civilization.
Galaxy Setup and Opponent Setup
These screens are very basic. We plan to make these much more tweakable than they were in GC3. One new AI feature (not in the Alpha) is the option for players to have dynamic intelligence. You still set their intelligence like you would before but their intelligence will increase or decrease depending on how they’re doing (to certain limits). The idea is to provide a better game experience. This feature will be ON by default once it’s implemented.
Into the Game
This is what you will see at the start.
Your Survey ship is selected at the start and you now have advisors who will suggest what you should do. We will also have VO for advisors as well eventually.
Survey ships do what they have always done which is explore anomalies. However, this time it takes a turn for them to do so:
This helps a bit with pacing and allows us to justify giving a little more meat to the anomalies.
Your First Colony
Pretty much every planet will have an event now. Here is the one for Mars.
The options in this example include:
- Get a leader
- Get an extra mineral
- Get an extra tech
This lets me segway into what colonies do.
Colonies vs. Core Worlds
This is a feature I wish we had come up with in GalCiv I let alone GalCiv IV. Lots of planets are colonizable but most of them are pretty awful. By default a colonized planet is a colony that feeds its core world. In this case: Earth.
So while Elon Musk is on Mars, what does it do for us?
These planets send out potentially 5 raw resources:
- Minerals
- Tech
- Wealth
- Food
- Culture
These then go to their associated core world:
This isn’t done yet by any means (it’s missing culture for instance). The planet then takes these inputs (including its own natural resources) and send them to the citizens:
That’s these guys:
This is your population. Unlike in previous GalCiv games, population isn’t some number that we use head canon to make sense of. Instead, it is represented by citizens.
Each citizen has its own stats:
Humans, being generic race basically, have fine stats. Perfectly fine. Not bad. Not good. Each stat corresponds with one of the outputs of the planet or some other planet stat.
Different species have different stats. For example, the Drengin have super-high resolve. The Torians have really high diligence. And yes, you will have planets with mixed races on them whose morale might change based on what you’re doing with their home worlds (i.e. have Drengin on your planet but you’re at war with the Drengin? Bad things).
Now, enhancing these citizens are your planetary upgrades.
There are three different types of upgrades:
- Improvements
- Districts
- Projects
In previous games, we crammed all these into improvements which resulted in the game becoming pretty unwieldly later on. It also became a little frustrating because we had to name every improvement so you would be like “So is a Manufacturing Center better than a Mega Factory??”. Now, it’s simply a Manufacturing District that levels up based on techs and if there’s something special, that’s the improvement and those are one of a kind.
The tiles are color coded based on what gives a bonus. Bonuses being things that level up a given type of district or improvement.
All of this then ends up with the planetary output:
Minerals become manufacturing.
Tech becomes research.
Wealth becomes revenue.
Culture becomes influence.
Food…well food stays food unless we can come up with a better name.
These outputs are what grow your civilization in various ways.
The Shipyard
A core planet can have a shipyard. Colonies feed the core world and the core world feeds the Shipyard. This means that a shipyard doesn’t have multiple sponsors. Just its core world.
Early on, the ship choices are pretty basic. Colony ship or scout. Immediately available technologies include Starbases, Survey Ships, Armed Shuttles, Asteroid miners and others that greatly increase this.
Researching
Researching is very different in GalCiv IV. Now, the game will pull 4 random techs (5 if you have a research minister). You can “reshuffle” but it will make that tech cost 10% more for each reshuffle.
We have the tech tree button locked for now but it will be replaced with a research explorer. That’s because the new “tech tree” is much more sophisticated and not easily displayed on the screen.
New Colonists
There are no “administration points” in GalCiv IV. Your limiting factor will be people. For instance, when you build a colony ship you will need to move a citizen on to it:
So even though there area ton of planets to colonize and nothing technically stops you from colonizing all of them, you will find your population not able to keep up with your ambitions.
Leaders
The game should prompt you (but it is not in this build) that you have some leader candidates waiting. Leaders are citizens with leadership training.
Leaders cost money to hire. Eventually, players can train their own citizens to be leaders but early on, you can only get them from recruiting. The red box you see here (unfortunately) is how loyal they are. Shockingly, random humans I recruit for money are not extremely loyal for some reason.
Loyalty matters because it affects how likely they are to betray you. For example, to make a given colony a core world, you have to assign a governor to that planet. The governor provides perks and carries out your orders. The more colonies they have, the more likely they are to rebel (thus, there it a temptation to have a single mega world but you will find that creates problems).
When I hire a leader, I can make them a minister. The bonus they provide is based on their stats. For instance, Pranav here has an intelligence of 10. So when I make him my Minister of Tech, he gives me a 10% boost to research. If I had made him my minister of colonization, he’d have given me +1 moves but only +5 range because his diligence is only 5.
You can also assign leaders to govern planets.
Assigning leaders to marginal planets isn’t just a waste of a leader, it’s not very useful either because marginal worlds are never as effective as it would be as a colony having its resources greatly multiplied by its core world.
There are 3 other things to do with leaders as well:
- Diplomats. Assigning someone to be a diplomat allows you to spy on another civilization or improve your relations with them depending on your orders. This hasn’t been fully fleshed out yet. Intelligence = Spying ability and Social = Diplomatic improvement bonus.
- Commanders. Leaders also have a starship that they come with. You can choose to put them on the board as ships.
- Think Tanks. As precious as leaders are early game, late game you will have quite a few of them. Think Tanks allow you to use leaders to bump up your civilization’s bonuses in various areas.
Backstories
You may have notice a little text blurb on the leaders. That’s because each and every one has a backstory. You may (but probably won’t) run into a mission that is triggered by a given leader’s backstory. This matters because you will want to pay a little attention to the leaders to make sure they don’t have a backstory that’s going to come back to haunt you. Similarly, a leader who has a lost treasure in the family might result in something great for you.
The Map
GalCiv is known for being able to zoom in and out with total fluidity. This is being taken up a notch this time. In GalCiv IV, the start of the game is going to feel a lot like previous GalCiv’s.
Zooming out:
Solar system.
Zooming out:
Sector. What? Sector.
Zooming out:
Galactic.
Think of a map in GalCiv III, the entire map, as being a single sector. GalCiv IV can have many sectors depending on your map setup. These sectors are connected through subspace streams. You have to research techs to even see where the subspace streams and then another tech to travel through them.
Controlling a sector brings benefits, in particular, prestige.
Prestige
The most basic strategy game problem has been with us since the 4X genre was invented. You know you’ve won but it’s going to take you another 2 hours to actually get the game to acknowledge that. How do you solve that? GalCiv IV has a new victory condition: Prestige.
Prestige is designed to have the player win (we haven’t decided if AI players can win through this mechanism or not) if it’s obvious they’re going to eventually win. Each player collects prestige through their accomplishments. When the human player has the majority of the galactic prestige they win. Owning sectors is one obvious way to do that. To own a sector, you just need to control the most parsecs in that sector.
Another way to earn prestige are through galactic achievements.
These are disabled in Alpha 1 but they are, in essence, a bunch of lore-centric “quests” that if you have certain pre-requisites in your game become enabled and reward you, amongst other things, with prestige. So rather than having to grind through 2 more hours of cranking out ships or building influence or waiting to win via diplomacy you can alternatively win by triggering the Dread Lords return and fighting them off or uncovering the artifact that the Thalan are looking for (ahh see they’re not totally gone!) or numerous other really interesting situations.
Most achievements won’t be available in a given game because the conditions just won’t be right. But this also means a lot of replayability rewards. For instance, you can’t exactly exact revenge on the Drengin take over of Toria in 1543 if you aren’t playing as the Torians.
Executive Orders
The game should prompt you about executive orders but my build doesn’t have this yet. Executive orders are another obvious feature that we should have had in GalCiv I but I was too dumb to think of it back then.
Here’s how they work:
The planet you directly control (the capital world) gives you 1 point of control per turn. Your governed worlds can also give you a point of control per turn IF you place a special improvement on there. However, doing so really makes the governor angry.
Different civilizations have different executive orders and more are unlocked as new technology and new events and missions occur.
You spend control to, for instance, get a free colony ship or get a bunch of money (with a bunch of crime) or call an election.
Policies
Another feature not in GalCiv IV Alpha but coming soon are policies. These essentially let you pick and choose how you want your civilization to work. Different civs have different policies available to them.
Ideology Compass
Next week I’ll be talking about this feature. It’s actually going away so I won’t spend too much time on it. It’s being replaced by Culture Spectrums.
Ship Upgrades
Fleets can get upgrades when their XP grows. That upgrade only goes to 1 ship in the fleet.
Ship upgrades can boost moves, weapons or even give them other goodie that you’ve found.
Movements
Within your civilization are a number of movements. In other games, you might think of these as religious sects.
Ironically, these only make sense when Policies are unlocked but gaining favor with these movements will give you a lot of power in the policy screen.
Constructors and Starbases
This feature is in flux as we are developing this and the AI in tandem. But here’s the short version:
Constructors build starbases. You can upgrade them in lots of interesting ways. These upgrades cost a new resource called Modules that are produced at your shipyard.
Asteroid Mining
You can mine the asteroids but rather than just conjuring them with money you have to build an Asteroid miner and and them here.
These asteroids are then mined for their minerals which are then sent to their nearest world as…(wait for it)….minerals.
Trading
This part of the game is still a work in progress.
New in GC4 is the ability to threaten and persuade. You can attempt to get a better deal during negotiations by using these intangible “resources” to get a better deal.
Moreover, not shown here is that the size of the deal is governed by your diplomacy ability. Thus, trading civs will be able to conduct much bigger trades than ones without it.
Space Monsters
The galaxy is much more dangerous in GC4.
Space Monsters don’t just remove a ship from your service, they actually lay eggs in them and then the ship becomes another space monster. This was enough of an issue that I had to write an emergency AI update for the alpha because the AI was feeding these things ships.
Good Planets
There aren’t very many good planets out there. But when you do find one, you can add an governor to it in another way other than how I mentioned earlier.
Admittedly, we should add a button to take you to the recruit screen too.
Optimizing Immigration
Over time, you will have a lot of different races on your planets.
Some species are better than others for certain worlds if you have one in mind.
In my head canon on most Sci-Fi shows that involve ancient races, I tend to think humanoids spread out because their “masters” picked them lazily because they’re average at all things.
Pirates
There are a lot more pirates and other baddies out there. The thing to know here: Pirates can conquer planets. In fact let’s get into that.
Conquering Planets
Core Worlds require invasion technology and a transport with a legion of soldiers on board. But colonies? Not so much. A colony can be invaded with any armed ship. Pirates can’t colonize planets but they’ll happily use yours.
Similarly, we are working hard on the AI to make sure they understand the opportunities being presented when they see a bunch of undefended planets.
Conclusions
So this is really just the start of the GalCiv IV journey. We have so many more features and improvements to make. The goal of Alpha 1 is mainly just to see what we broke. Does it even run on your computer? What sort of ghastly problems did our new design not take into account of?
The rest of June will be spent just fixing terrible terrible bugs. Then in July we’ll get into adding in the obvious missing features that we already have. Then in August through November we’ll be implementing your ideas and suggestions as well as throwing out features that seemed like a good idea and replacing them with ones based on your feedback.
WHERE IS THE ALPHA?
We are running the Alpha here on galciv4.com (Early Access won’t be on Steam). We love Steam (and in particular I like a lot of the store improvements this year). But we really want a single forum for feedback and we want to discourage people from joining the Alpha unless they are super into being apart of the game design and development process.
I would love to hear your thoughts.
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Galactic Civilizations IV Dev Journals
AI. In play
terms, it means that your opponents actually use better strategy
at the harder play levels, rather than relying on various
"cheats" to give them enough advantages to make the game a
challenge. The level of "smartness" is adjustable for each race
in the game and varies from "brain-dead" to "incredible" in 6
steps. The smartness levels less than "genius" are actually
handicapped. Brad Wardell's discussion of this feature is
detailed below.
The game features economic and population growth models that take
into account the level of taxation and the level of happiness of
the people. The level of happiness is related to the level of
social amenities on the planet as well as the degree of freedom
that is availible within the type of government. The game
designers admit to being influenced by "supply side" economics,
so your strategies in the game should take this into account.
The more democratic forms of government (Star Democracy and Star
Federation) have a senate that has elections every decade. Your
level of popularity determines your level of support in the
senate. The senate has the power to reject declarations of war
_or_ changes of governmental form. They actually vote on these
decisions and are not a rubber stamp for or against your
decisions.
Hardware Requirements
Chapter 1.2
SDS recommends at least a .... (i will look this up), about 14 MB
hard disk free (plus the swap space requirement of about 12 MB, but
remember that this is a SYSTEM swap space, not just for GalCiv), 8 MB
of RAM and all the speed you can get. (not that you need the speed
to run GalCiv, it's just that it's more interesting to drive a Lotus
than a Yugo.) This is, more or less, the full installation with
..avi files and sound.
*****************************************************************
************ STRATEGIES and OTHER HOT TIPS **********************
*****************************************************************
Chapter 2
How do I ????
The on-line help files actually make some of this faq a bit
redundant. Most of the button, menus, windows, etc. appear to
be nicely arranged in a hypertext file. Since this is an OS/2
program, help is just another window you can consult during the
the game. Play with it, it's informative. This is not to say
that the help is complete. It is missing some of the "Data
and Numbers" stuff I've outlined below, and has two large sections
wherein it explains that something goes in this spot.
How do I find the best planets?
Scouts seem to be the best way of locating any planets of
worth. Sometimes, if the geometry of the situation is
right, you might be able to predict where another race's
colony ship is headed and beat them to the spot.
John Martz suggests using 2 scouts to block another race from
colonizing a choice planet before you do. This strategy works
until impulse when you need 3 scouts. There are seldom any
planets left to colonize once you get Warp Drive.
Other than this, send your scouts out on an ever increasing
spiral and send out the colonists. The scout can be sent on
a diagonal sweep through a quadrant to pick up >50% of the
area in one pass or send it on a U-shaped course to pick
up 100%. The path of the "U" can be adjusted to have the
scout adjacent to the next target quadrant when it finishes.
Two scouts could be used to map a quadrant in one pass.
How does the economic system function?
There are three factors that affect the economy directly.
1) the tax-n-spend icon [$]: This icon gives you access to two
sliders that control the taxation rate and the spending rate.
Each represents the percentage of the availible that you are
tapping into, be it taxable income or spending capacity. Set
the % at 100 for taxes and you're taking all of the peoples'
money. They will not like this. Set the % at 100 for
spending, and you are spending at your maximum ability to
spend. If you take in more money than you spend, it builds up
in a treasury. Aside from overt taxation, your government
sponsors inter-galactic traders that give you a cut. This
helps fund your ambitious goals of ....inter-species alliance
or galactic conquest. It should be noted that Dean Iverson first
proposed a model similar to this one to Brad and company.
Continuing efforts on the part of Steve Lamb, one of the beta
testers, helped convince SDS to implement this model in the game.
This is a compliment to Dean and Steve since the previous one was
a bit...less flexible.
2) the allocation icon [three horizontal sliders]: This icon
gives you access to three slider that control the % of your
spending that is going into military projects (star ships,
including colony ships and freighters), social projects
(entertainment centers, antimatter plants) and research
(technology advancement).
3) the planets [planets]: Each planet can handle building one
project or one ship at a time. If no planets are actually
building something, then you are not actually spending any
money and any reserve goes into your treasury.
How do I allocate my funds?
Funding is divided between ships (military), research and
social spending (planetary construction). In the early game,
I've tried pumping out the colony ships as fast as possible
with a 60/30/10 split on resources, plus setting my spending
level at 80% and keeping taxes at 28%. Observations: it's not
a sure-fire plan. I seem to spend too much time playing
"catch-up". I need to catch-up in research, social spending
and despite the high spending on colony ships, planets. I'm
now trying a more even split. Any comments on this would be
appreciated.
A more successful approach that I have using lately was
suggested by John Martz. Set the the resource sliders to a
25/50/25 split. This game is driven by technology. He with
the best tech wins, or at least has a good shot at winning.
Getting to Impulse as fast as you can is paramount. Now, pump
out the colony ships and use you're hopefully superior movement
rate to compensate for your lack of omniscience. On the
technology front, shoot for Universal Translator and then
Galactic Trade.
How do I increase the population of my planets?
Make happy people. Happy people do happy things, and one of
those things is to increase the planet's population. One main
influence is taxation. If the tax rate is too high, then the
population does not grow, and in fact, even decreases. It is
not so much that you're taxing your people to death but that
instead of staying in your little settlement, they've joined
the Inter-stellar Posse Commitas. A planet is a very big
place, and a few hundred thousand, spread out, would be real
hard to find. However, be careful about lowering the tax rate
since the population gets even more unhappy about raising
taxes once they've been lowered than if you had kept them the
same.
Taxation aside, another method is to increase the moral of the
people through various social programs. Planetary programs
have primarily three functions: increase moral, increase
production or other. Most programs have mixed benefits but
some target one aspect in particular. Example: Entertainment
Networks. They do not help research or starship attacks, but
your people are much happier.
If your people are unhappy living where they are, ship them
somewhere else; off to war, for example. I've been known to
stick them in orbit, waiting for the next war. Reducing the
population of a planet is one way to make the remaining people
happy. It's best not to speculate why.
Reduce pollution. Polluted planets are unhappy planets.
Although Earth First! would not be a good name for unhappy
people in this situation, the projects your planets are
building may have to be put on hold to prevent widespread
revolt. Consider building pollution abatement projects.
And lastly, reform your government. The increased freedoms of
the Star Democracy and the Star Federation can generate
happier people. However, if you already have low morale (40%
or less), going to these forms of government may actually
foster widespread revolt. While I've not tested it
personally, I am under the impression that Imperial
Governments do not suffer revolts. Or, at least, it has
to get a _whole_ lot worse than under the other two forms.
A GENERAL NOTE!!!!
DON'T FORGET THE RESOURCE ALLOCATION BUTTONS!!!
The details window of the planet can let you fine tune the
amount of resources you spend on various aspects of your
planet. You can vary the allocations between social projects
(the cornucopia), military projects (the open-end wrench),
research (the OS/2 terminal), and morale (the microphone).
Consider allocating resources at the local level instead of
doing it galactically with the sliders. (thanks, John)
Which research path should I select?
The beginning is easy. Take General Cold Fusion, followed by
Impulse Drive, then Universal Translator and Galactic Trade.
Start your trading empire since money is the key!!!!! Then,
pick up Galactic Diplomacy and race for Warp Drive (via
Antimatter) and Shields (via Deflectors). Then, grab
Battle Tech I. Above all, trade, trade, trade. Tech and
goods. However, don't trade Battle Tech unless it's with
an ally! John Martz first articulated this strategy in
several of his posts to comp.sys.os2.games. Of course, there
are lots of ways to play the game, this is one that works for
many.
What's the best way to conduct a war?
Aggressively! Given the design of the game, being the
attacker is _the_ bonus. What I mean by this, is that you
should _attack_ incoming, enemy vessels, rather than letting
them attack your systems and using the planetary defense bonus
as your protection. Cover your home systems with one
(maybe 2) ships and have a fleet nearby to attack incoming,
enemy vessels. It can also be handy to leave one planet
unguarded to act as a trap for enemy transports. Some of the
personalities in the AI do not see ships sitting in space as a
vicious threat, which they are. They only occasionally
attack them. Beware of Draginol. This military commander
was tweaked to counter this strategy and makes extensive use
of stealth cruisers.
How do I make friends and influence enemies?
Trade. Other routes of influence are the "secretly declare
war" option and the "destablize" option under the GIA.
How do I select the best trade routes?
Rich planet to rich planet, I think. I must admit to not
being very quantitative on this one, but that is what I think
I've been seeing. Do note, that as your planets improve,
you will need to send out new freighters to take advantage
of your increased planet wealth. New technology begets new
products for trade that in turn require new trade routes to
be established.
How do I bargain with those dirtba.... the customers?
hmmm????
In general, there are three basic characteristics for the race
with whom you are attempting to bargain. The first is their
"greed" level. I guess this affects how quickly they are
satisfied with a deal. The second characteristic is how
ethical they are. I suspect this governs whether the initial
bid will be reasonable or not. The last racial trait is
guillibility, which is easily tied to how tough it is to just
plain bargain with them. As a note, your fifth bid is your
last bid. If that bid is not accepted, you have lost the
deal.
Which planets should be doing what construction?
Obvious suggestions: always opt to increase production on a
planet, but other than that, chose military projects for the
frontier planets and social/research projects for the interior
planets. Beyond this, any planet I've colonized has built
"Soil Enhancement" followed by "Schools" and then
Entertainment Network". All three are cheap to build. Schools
have no maintenance cost so that is why I include them. The
choice of the Entertainment Network may be dubious. It is
expensive to maintain.
John Martz suggested Schools then Soil Enhancement. Since
a solid research program can be the key to this game, I concur
with this strategy, unless your tax rate is too high. If the
the tax rate is high (40%+) then the morale of the inhabitants
may be too low. Schools do not add enough morale, but a Soil
Enhancement project may.
Aside from an Excaliber, are there really any better ships than a
starfighter?
Yes, there are. From reading the net posts, the most
commonly used ships for offense are War Hammers, Interceptors,
and Battle Ships. Interceptors, with their superlative speed,
are good for scouting out what, if any, enemy ships are
approaching the area. Use the interceptor as a lure to drag
the enemy ships away from the vulnerable system. Interceptors
are just good enough to try and whomp the occasional
transport. However, they will often take damage from these
attacks, so caution is advised. War Hammers are
a poor man's battle ship. Yes, they can take out a Battle
Ship now and then. But, they will often take damage from such
an encounter. The AI will usually not attack a ship at full
strength but seldom lets a wounded foe escape. The Battle
Ship (and its off-spring) is the queen of the battle field.
Keep one or more handy near the home worlds for defense and
send the rest out on conquest. Watch the damage they
accumulate. If one takes too much, send it home for repairs.
They cost too much to try and rebuild from scratch. In
addition, Battle Cruisers are a good ship when you can't build
War Hammers. They are cheaper than Battle Axes, with a better
defense and higher speed.
For defense, the Defender, in orbit, is a good ship. If you
opt to be a good player (or you manage to trade for it), the
Corvette is an excellent ship on defense. In orbit, it can
take the occasional Battle Ship. This is definitely worth it!
As for the other ships, one of the most important is the
transport. Although I have yet to use this strategy, it would
seem that building some transports on a planet when it's not
doing any other projects is a good idea. You can blast the
opposing star fleet to radioactive debris but you've done
nothing unless you can invade!
And for completeness, the colony ship is, of course, without
peer for being important! Next, try the freighter. Without
enough revenue from trade, your dreams of empire will most
likely come to naught. I would suggest holding a few
freighters in reserve for the inevitable lose of a trade or
two during a conflict.
I'm getting some crazy swapper growth. What did you guys do? Can't
you write a simple video game? Where's my lawyer???
Swapper growth was one of the most trying problems we had
with GalCiv. Because there are few large scale games (at the time
of GalCiv, there are no others that we know of), many of OS/2's more
obscure API calls were not well tested. As a result, tiny leaks in
OS/2 never got caught. Lucky for us, GalCiv uses those calls a lot
and those tiny leaks add up. There are, however, some solutions to
the problem (if you are getting it).
#1 Make sure you have GalCiv v1.01c or later. It works
around most of OS/2's leaks.
#2 MOST IMPORTANT: Set your swapper file size to default
to at least 8 megabytes. This can be done by going to
the config.sys and changing the second number in the
swapper path statment to 8092. We do not know why
this works but in my experience, this completely
eliminates swapper growth. I theorize that once your
swapper starts to grow in OS/2 (particularly OS/2 3.0)
it will just grow and grow and grow. By the way, this
advice applies to every OS/2 app, not just GalCiv.
#3 If you are still getting growth, try turning off the
sound and making sure Fastload (Windows) isn't activated.
#4 If none of the above work, contact IBM or SDS or AIMS.
How to I invade other colonies?
You need to build Transports. You obviously can't take over an
entire planet with a star fighter so you need troops. When you build
a transport, you can put troops onto the ship and then take it to an
UNDEFENDED planet.
I haven't bought GalCiv yet. What other games is it like?
It is most like Civilization with respect to the fact that you are trying
to create a civilization. It is like Empire in terms of how you work
you strategy. Each ship is its own unit. It also combines some elements of
Masters of Orion since you can win the game by forming a united galaxy
and diplomacy is a much more important aspect of the game than in
Civilization or Empire.
I really like GalCiv but I miss the feature in Masters of Orion where I
could design my own ships. Is there any way to make GalCiv more like
Masters of Orion?
On January 1, 1995, SDS will be releasing Shipyards for GalCiv which
will be an add on that lets you do just that. When Shipyards is
installed, a new button will appear on the icon bar that will let you
create new ships. Your opponents will also be able to build their own
ships. You can even choose how your ship will look like. One added
feature is that you can "steal" ship designs from your opponents.
Is it easier to win by being good or evil? Where's the payoff for being
a good guy?
Being a nice guy has never meant that you get rewarded. It works
like this though, good guys are treated better by other nice
civilizations. Being a bad guy offers a lot of short term benefits
but good civilizations will likely come after you while other evil
civilizations won't lift a finger to help you. There are about a
dozen technologies available only to good guys (there are also about
10 technologies only available to evil players too).
I've been hearing a lot about GalCiv but where I live there are no stores
that carry OS/2 software. How can I get GalCiv?
The best thing you can do is to try to get your store to carry it.
However, if that doesn't work, you can order it from numerous sources
including SDS. SDS's number is (313)782-2248 (FAX: 313-782-9868). All
you need is a credit card (or you can order it COD). They'll need your
name, address, city, zip, credit card number and expiration date. A
distributor called Micro Central will be the place to tell stores that
they can get it from.
I don't have OS/2, just Windows 3.1. Will there be a Windows 3.1 version
of GalCiv?
No.
How do I repair my ships?
Take them home. A ship can only be repaired by placing it in
orbit about its home-WORLD, not system. Also note that if a
ship is in orbit about it's homeworld and it takes damage, it
is not automatically repaired. Take it out of orbit and back
in to repair the damage. Shakedown cruise? ((This may not be
true for the GA. Let me know about this.))
What does it mean that this game has a configurable set-up?
For me, it means that I can move the quadrant map to the left
hand side of the screen, move the button bar to the middle and
over-draw the graphs and button bar with my star map. If I
need the other two, I use the RMB to pop them up.
*****************************************************************
************ CHEATS and OTHER BLACK HOLES ***********************
*****************************************************************
Chapter 3
There are at least two little "holes" in the game for
unscrupulous players to exploit. Or frustrated players....
Or those days you just wanna trash the galaxy and you don't care
how you do it....Or....
1) "REAL" Warp Drive
If you move your ship out the corner of a border quadrant at
the border, your ship will appear in the next quadrant in the
same square you attempted to "leave". This is obviously a way of
moving REAL FAST (done in a Dave Barry voice).
2) Population Growth via "Shore Leave"
If you remove all the troops from a transport, leave and then
return that ship to its homeworld, it will instantly gain another
20,000 troops (20 legions). Repeat as needed. As a note, this
is also a bug. In the bug state, your transport full of legions
gets "repaired" to the 20 level.
3) Prescience
You can always save the game after it starts and then map out
the universe. It would probably be easiest to do a <print
screen> and then annotate the print-out. Then, restart.
Since the AI doesn't cheat, you can be a true prophet and
know exactly what is going to happen.
*****************************************************************
*****************************************************************
The following is courtesy Brad Wardell of Stardock Systems, Designer
of GalCiv. Brad hides at 22wardel@cs.wmich.edu. I did some editing.
The AI:
The AI is split into two modules: SDSAI.DLL which is a general
artificial intelligence engine that we'll be using in other
products and GCAI.DLL which is specific to GalCiv.
The key thing to remember about the AI in GalCiv is that it does
not make a distinction between you and the computer players. It
uses the same code as the human players does for moving ships,
building projects, etc. It plays by the same rules except for a
couple of important differences:
#1 The Computer players are NOT currently allowed to purchase
ships. We felt that it would make the game too difficult if the
computer players were allowed to (like you can) just use their
treasury and buy a ship every turn. If people are able to beat
the AI regularly on the higher levels then we may reconsider this
but for now, this human advantage is in the GA.
#2 Human players cannot send the AI nasty messages like the AI
can to you. This is obviously for entertainment value. Human
players also can't ask for help from friendly players in the form
of "give us ships". This may be added in a v1.1 or something.
#3 The computer players start out with a planet whereas you start
out in a space ship. This is for plot reasons. Unlike the
betas, in the GA you will have the possibility of having type 16
planets in your starting quadrant (in the betas, you only got
class 12 planets guaranteed).
#4 The Aliens already know what color all the stars are in surrounding
quadrants.. This is a huge advantage since yellow stars almost always have
a nice planet in them. This was put in for plot reasons (beta 1 testers
complained that it didnt' make any sense for the AI not to have mapped
out most of the galaxy (afterall, we earthlings have in our native galaxy
over the milenium).
Other than that, the AI follows the same rules. If you find that
the AI is doing something you deem unfair, email me with a bug
report because that is what it would be, a bug. The AI doesn't
distinguish between you and other players for among other things,
the possibility of adding modem/network play in later versions
(should the game do well in the market).
GC/AI:
The GCAI is what we could call the politicians. IT
decides when to go to war, how to talk to you, how to approach
you in dealing with things. It takes into account when dealing
other playres (including you):
Their good/evil alignment.
Their relative military strength.
Trade agreements and how nice things went.
Their aggression level.
Their cooperation level
Their ethical level
Their greed level
Their insanity level* (the computer looks only at its
own. It doesn't know the other
players' insanity level)
(all of these they look at their own level and the other
players).
* note, the AI may not KNOW all of these about a player,
they go with what information they have available.
All of the above information is available to the human
player either directly or from spying. In fact, none of the
above things require you to even spy on them, since you can find
this information in the GIA window and under the
espionage/military window under the GIA.
Good guys tend to bond with other good guys. They don't worry
about how tough or powerful the other good guy is (in general).
Keep in mind, only REALLY good guys will totally neglect your
military or trade with them when deciding to be nice to you or
someone else. There are 20 shades of Good.....EVIL (You can
select 5 differenet level of Good or evil for them but if you let
it randomly choose, it will have a finer granularity).
Really bad guys will look a bit more favorably on other really,
really bad guys but they don't tend to bond as well as good guys
do. Bad guys may not declare war on each other but they will
also not ally together quite as often. Still though, the end
result can be a game with Good vs. Evil if you select extremists.
The down-right neutrals (shade 10 out of 20) only care about
trade. You want a Ferengi-type race, choose a neutral. The
EXACT neutral type has extra logic to make it a fence sitter.
There's, of course, a lot more detail in this but I don't want to
spoil the game too much !
SDS/AI:
The GCAI are the politicians, the SDSAI are the generals.
The GA version of GalCiv has 5 different release level
Personalities or Advisors. You can imagine each personality
being a separately programmed entity. They share some common
code for things such as dodging obstacles and finding undefended
star systems that they know of, but most of what they do is
unique. This is important because if people say, "The AI was
dumb, it chased my scout all over the place while I trashed the
rest of them, heh heh", they really should say "Advisor N is
dumb, they did ..." because the others may not (and do not) do
things the same way.. Some Personalities go for having a large
trading fleet, others will play vulture and will quit colonizing
quickly and then build trasnports (gee, I bet none of you guys
did something as low as that, eh?).
The Advisors Code names can be found by looking in the
Espionage Window under "Military".
The names are:
Sauronir
Denethor
Draginol
Mascrinthus
Calor
Not all of the personalities will use Terror Stars, for
example, because of their destructive value. People who die as a
result of being killed on a transport (when you destroy a
transport) or on a planet due to a terror star are now counted as
part of the overall casaulty list. So if you get Terror Stars (or
the AI uses them), you'll know how many troops (in legions: 1
legion = 1k troops) have been destroyed.
End submission by Mr. Wardell
****************************************************************
***************** WHERE IS THE xxxx? *************************
****************************************************************
- autopilot on/off?
Under the floppy disk icon is the setup button. This button
pops up that function and other useful functions such as sound,
avi, etc.
- background process control?
Under the floppy disk icon is the setup button. This button
pops up that function and other useful functions such as sound,
avi, etc.
- place to reform my government?
Under the icon up from the floppy disk icon is the reform gov't
button. It's the "Reports" icon that looks like a sheet of
paper.
- the reports of how I am doing?
There are four types of "how am I doing" information. All of
this information resides under the "Reports Icon" (the sheet of
paper). The first option is the "Top Five Planets" listing. One
should strive at all times to keep this free of alien riff-raff.
A second option is the "Demographics" listing. This is a screen
of statistics such as % of galactic population, absolute and %
production values, etc. A third option is the button that
compares humanity to all of the other races in the game. It's a
relative scoring that shows how much you're pumping into R&D
relative to your competitors. The fourth option is the score
button which also gives you a good/neutral/bad ranking.
- listing of my ships?
The icon with the Earth over a triangle is the fleet icon.
From here, you can click on a ship and then either pull up the
ship display window (if it's in orbit) or it will plop you into
the quadrant that the ship occuppies and highlight that ship.
- place to find out how much damage my ship has taken?
There are 3 ways to find this out. One, use the RMB to pull up
the ship control menu. Two, look at the strength number at the
bottom of the screen. Three, look at how many black smudges are
smeared across the ship menu at the bottom of the screen. The
more smudges, the worse off the ship is.
- that planet that was preparing to rebel?
Click on that planet in the GNN window when it appears. You
will then be flipped over to the planet menu to deal with the
problem. For getting to a planet in a more general way, use the
icon with the planets on it to pull up an alphabetical listing of
all of your planets.
*****************************************************************
TECHNOLOGY TREE (or "Can I get Artificial Life if I can't Phase
properly?")
*****************************************************************
Chapter 5.1
**** under construction ****
**** please bear with us ***
Nano-Electronics
-> Nano-Frequencies -> Brainwave Mapping
-> Instant -> Cure for Depression
Communications
-> Star Federation
-> Nano-Metal Composition -> High Density Metals (destroyer)
-> Tri-Strontium Alloys
-> Large Scale Building (warhammer)
Brainwave Mapping
Large Scale Building
-> Terra Computers
-> Advanced AI's
-> Hyper-Computers
-> Interspecies Philosophy
General Cold Fusion (small fighter)
-> Impulse (transport)
-> Anti-matter
-> Warp Drive
-> Hyperspace
-> Hyperwarp (if a good race)
Phasor (interceptor)
-> Turbo-phasor (battlecruiser)
-> Advanced Phasor (if a good race) (corvette)
-> Mega-phasor
-> Antimatter Weapons
Photon Weapons (star fighter)
-> Sensors (battle ax)
Organic Manipulation
-> Genetic Mapping
-> Transporters
Universal Translator
-> Galactic Trade (freighter)
-> Galactic Diplomacy
-> Alliances
-> Star Democracy
and there's more...
BIG NOTE! missing the evil technologies! there are lots of
them, such as Galactic Collusion, Distruptors, Master Race,
Thought Control, Clever Chip, and more!
*****************************************************************
PROJECTS - (or "Gee, we need 0-G porta-potties.
What does it do and how do we do it?)
*****************************************************************
Chapter 5.2
The following is an alphabetized listing of the various projects
that can be built on a planet if the technology is available.
The project names were, in some cases, abbreviated to near
obscurity. I was attempting to get enough room on the right-hand
side to put in the technology necessary to achieve the project.
They didn't fit, so I duplicated the list and used full names.
The various abbreviations for effects (first list) are as
follows: TI = Trade Increase; Mor = Morale; Ship A = Ship
Attack; Ship D = Ship Defense; Gnd Def = Ground
Defense; Res = Research; Env = Anti-pollution Effect;
Maint = Maintenance; Cost = Cost in bc.
It should be noted that since I usually play the good-guy role, the
projects here include many of the projects that only "nice guys" can
get to such as Advanced Hospitals. In GalCiv, what technologies
are available to you depends on whether you are good or evil.
Production Ship Gnd
Project Name | TI Mor| A D |Def|Res|Env|Maint|Cost|
--------------|-----------------|---|---|---|-----|----|
Adv Hospital | 15 05 10 | -- --|-- | 05| | 4 | 900|
Adv Mil Trn | 15 -- 10 | 35 --|60 | --| | 0 |1100|
Adv Poll Ctrl | 30 10 20 | -- --|-- | 01| 10| 3 |1500|
Antimtr Plant | 83 33 50 | 02 --|-- | 02| | 4 |1000|
Cont Environ | 30 30 -- | -- --|-- | --| | 0 |2000|
Currency Sys | 25 15 10 | -- 01|-- | 01| | 3 | 500|
Defense Sys | 06 01 05 | 10 15|45 | 01| | 5 |1100|
Entertain Net | 37 02 35 | -- --|-- | --| | 4 | 100|
Environ Ctrl | 05 -- 05 | -- --|-- | --| 3| 2 | 500|
Fusion PP | 35 25 10 | 10 --|-- | 05| | 3 | 500|
Gal Curr Exc | 72 20 52 | -- --|-- | --| | 5 |1000|
Gal Ent Ntwk | 35 -- 35 | -- --|-- | --| | 4 | 500|
Gal Info Net | 22 10 12 | -- --|-- | 30| | 4 |1000|
Gnd Defense | 04 -- 04 | 03 03|50 | --| | 3 | 200|
Hydroponics | 30 10 20 | -- --|-- | 10| | 3 |1100|
Im Poll Ctrl | 15 05 10 | -- --|-- | --| 5| 5 |1000|
Info Net | 10 02 08 | -- --|-- | 10| | 2 | 100|
Int Security | 06 01 05 | 02 08|-- | --| | 1 | 300|
Mil Academy | 10 -- 10 | 15 05|50 | --| | 2 | 380|
Mutat Ctrl | 40 10 30 | 01 01|-- | 02| | 1 | 900|
Multimedia | 20 05 15 | -- --|-- | --| | 4 | 800|
Phasing PP | 40 20 20 | -- --|-- | 20| | 10 |1000|
Planet Poll | 10 -- 10 | -- --|-- | --| 3| 1 | 500|
Schools | 06 02 04 | -- --|-- | 15| | 0 | 50|
Soil Enhan | 32 02 30 | -- --|-- | --| | 2 | 50|
Treat Ctr | 17 05 12 | -- --|-- | --| | 3 | 600|
University | 10 05 05 | 02 --|-- | 20| | 2 | 200|
Virt R Ctr | 60 10 50 | -- --|-- | --| | 5 | 900|
Evil Projects - I have yet to map out evilness.
Gal Collusion
etc.
..
..
Advanced Hospitals - Viral Elimination
Advanced Military Training - Terror Star
Advanced Pollution Control - Planetary Destruction
Antimatter Plant - Antimatter Weapons
Controlled Environment - Replication
Currency System - Star Democracy
Defense System - Planetary Defense
Entertainment Network - (given)
Environmental Controls - Nano Electronics
Fusion Power Plant - General Cold Fusion
Galactic Currency Exchange - 4D Phasing
Galactic Entertainment Network - Star Democracy
Galactic Info Net - Terra Computers
Ground Defense - (given)
Hydroponics - Organic Manipulation
Improved Pollution Control - Planetary Destruction
Info Net - Terra Computers
Internal Security - Sensors
Military Academy - Shields
Mutation Control - Evolution Control
Multimedia Center - 1D Phasing
Phasing Power Plant - 3D Phasing
Planetary Pollution Control - Artificial Planets
Schools - (given)
Soil Enhancement - (given)
Treatment Center - Advanced Pain Treatment
University - (given)
Virtual Reality Center - 3D Phasing
*****************************************************************
GALACTIC ACHIEVEMENTS (or "Inter-stellar Merit Badges Made
Easy!!)
*****************************************************************
Chapter 5.3
Cloaking Device - need: Cloaking
cost: 2000 bc
expiration date: NONE!
bonus: 30% ship attack, 1% defense
worth it????: yes, plus the big bonus of all ships
that are built are now equiped with
cloaking tech so they can't be tracked!
what if my neighbors
build one?: don't worry, every one has secrets.
Controlled Wormhole - need: Spatial Rifts
cost: 1400 bc
expiration date: ...forgot...
bonus: +50% trade! and 10% research
worth it????: maybe...depends upon if you're racing
for the tech that ends its useful
life.
what if my neighbors
build one?: I don't know.
Crystalai - need: Advanced AI's
cost: 4000 bc
expiration date: none
bonus: adds +1 to all inhabitated planet class
worth it????: it's a LONG project! But it is
worth the increased population growth.
what if my neighbors
build one?: anyone can improve their homes through
their local Planets-R-Us dealer!
Dinosaur Park Wonder: Replication
cost: 2000 bc
expiration date: Artificial Planets
bonus: +50% production
worth it????: if you're racing for Artificial
Planets, then this is not the project
for you.
what if my neighbors
build one?: sorry, only one per galaxy. Copyright.
Deep Thought - need: Terra Computers
cost: 2200 bc
expiration date: Omni Computers
bonus: +40% research for _ALL_ planets.
worth it????: Definitely one of the Wonders for which
to strive. The 40% research boost is
wonderful. (what? me? pun? nyah.)
what if my neighbors
build one?: The galaxy can only have one Deep
Thought.
Eyes of the Universe: Sensors
cost: 1000 bc
expiration date: none
bonus: none
worth it????: in a huge universe, probably so,
especially if you push straight for
it and gain its use for colonization.
Otherwise, it's of limited use
what if my neighbors
build one?: you're blind.
Galactic Stock Exchange: Star Democracy
cost: 920 bc
expiration date: NONE!
bonus: +50% trade
worth it????: Without a doubt! The only drawback
is the pollution it can create on a
very productive planet. Poor baby.
what if my neighbors
build one?: too late. you lose. start over.
HyperSpace Project- need: Hyperspace
cost: 1000 bc
expiration date: none
bonus: none
worth it????: if you're at war, the +2 move can be
a real nice advantage. If you're foes
have it, you are at a real
disadvantage, so you'd better get
building!
what if my neighbors
build one?: read the above carefully.
Life Creation - need: Artificial Life
cost: 2600 bc
expiration date: oops!
bonus: +25% morale, +30% research
worth it????: the morale and research bonuses are
nice. The project is a bit expensive
but if you want to stay ahead...?
what if my neighbors
build one?: don't know that one either.
Nano Robot Wonder- need: Nano Electronics
cost: 500 bc
expiration date: Terra Computers
bonus: none
worth it????: sure, why not? not much more expensive
than a fusion plant and gives more
output. But, if you're after those
info nets in a big hurry, don't bother.
what if my neighbors
build one?: no problem, build your own!
Peace for a time- need: Interspecies Philosophy
cost: ????
expiration date: ????
bonus: ????
worth it????: no clue. I've never had a chance to
build this project. Wild speculation?
It can only be built by alien races.
That would be cool....in a way.
what if my neighbors
build one?: You're assuming you can.
Trison Ring - need: Large Scale Building (I'll say!)
cost: 1200 bc
expiration date: none! ha, ha, ha, ha
bonus: +40% trade, +1% defense, +10% research
worth it????: YES! Just like the Galactic Stock
Exchange, build it!
what if my neighbors
build one?: too late.
Tur-Ahn Training- need: Planetary Defense
cost: 1100 bc
expiration date: Replication
bonus: +40% attack, defense, +100% ground def.
worth it????: if you are at war, want to go to war,
or fear being at war, don't hesitate.
what if my neighbors
build one?: hope they are your friends.
Utopia Colony - need: Utopia
cost: 6000 bc (ouch!)
expiration date: there is one.... I think.
bonus: +20% trade and morale
+5% attack, defense and ground def.
+20% research.
worth it????: it gives a lot of bonuses. It costs
a lot! It comes very late in the game.
More experience is definitely needed.
what if my neighbors
build one?: I hope everyone can have a utopia!
There are other evil Wonders (Super Projects/Galactic Achievements) you
can build too but those are not mapped out here.
*********************************************************************
TECHNOLOGY AND SHIPS (or "something clever goes here")
*********************************************************************
Chapter 5.4
-i think i'm going to re-do this in the style of the project table above.
that would be more useful.
Battleships <- Battle Tech I <- Warp Drive <- Antimatter
<- Shields <- Deflectors
Battlecruisers <- Turbophasors <- Phasors
Battle Ax <- Sensors <- Photon Torpedoes
Corvette <-
Defender
Destroyer <- High Density Metals
<- Nano-metal Composition
<- Nano Electronics
Interceptor <- Phasors
Small Fighter <- General Cold Fusion
Star Fighter <- Photon Torpedoes
War Hammer <- Large Scale Building
*****************************************************************
********************* Future Wishes *****************************
*****************************************************************
Chapter 6.0
Player Options (those changes affecting the player only)
- let the player ask for aid from the other races (net)
- the windows for fleet display and the planet display should be
sortable on any of the columns in the display. (i.e.- ship name,
planet name, production, location, ship class, etc.) (net)
- let the player choose the military advisors of the alien races.
Go for the ultimate punishment of chosing the nasty AI for all
the opponent races (or the opposite). (John Martz. The
masochist!)
- the naming of the star ships should allow for the place of
origin to be displayed _without_ having to pop-up a window. This
is vital information! (John Martz)
- or, put a "Return to Base" button in the ship display window.
(John Martz)
- there should be an increased number of options availible for
the player under the GIA button. These should include, but not
be limited to, requests by the player for aid; requests for
territory and/or money as a settlement for stopping a war (this
should include lump sum and "leases"); mutual treaties (ie - in a
2-on-1 war, you _and_ your ally would negotiate an end to the
fighting); "giving" technology to another race; foreign aid to
another race; treaties such as non-aggression pacts, warship size
limitations, planetary colonization agreements, etc.; and any
other options we can imagine! (net)
Alien Options (those changes affecting the other races only)
- each race should have its own grammer. It should not
necessarily be tied to any given race all the time. (me)
- more races for opponents with pretty pictures. Obviously, this
is a CD-ROM option given all the various resolutions that this
game supports. Maybe have the format for the pictures and their
number known, so that anyone can edit a race. (me)
Both (ah, obvious)
- multi-ship movement such as escort, fleet movement, and have
this reflect in the combat in some way. A fleet of ten
starfighters should be more of a force than ten individual
starfighters. Escorting ships should be attacked first, or maybe
even get first attack? (net)
- projects should have variable affects on the different planet
classes, possibly at different times in the planet's history.
Examples: Entertainment Networks should be more effective on poor
planets than better planets. As the pollution level increases,
the effectiveness of an Entertainment Network should get better,
but not enough to offset the pollution losses. (me)
- mining outposts, or resource allocation outposts should be
availible as either projects or military ventures. These should
be used to exploit other systems that don't have "habitable"
planets. They should increase production without pollution but
should create more unhappiness at the home system. (net)
- espionage should give the alien trade route table as one of the
possible outcomes. From here, the player could use "destabilize"
money to indirectly disrupt trade (a steady decline in income or
maybe an abrupt ending of the route) or assign ships to play pirate
on one or more trade routes. Conversely, a player should be able
to pull ships off the "line" to guard trade routes, either directly
or maybe in a "Q"-ship role. (me)
Game Characteristics (changes that affect game play and
environment more than any particular race characteristics.)
- the planets list should be unique for each race and possibly
modifiable by the player. This would permit the player to
customize his "own" race and pass it around for the delight of
all. (me)
- reduce the amount of "vacuum-effects". What I mean by a
vacuum-effect is the Trison Ring description. In this
description, it claims that the three planets were consumed in
making the Ring. If this is a real effect, then the Trison Ring
should only be built in systems that have three or more planets
of the type that can be used to build the Ring and the system
display should remove those planets once the Ring is complete. 
