\\\-- Balance of Power (v1.2c released)--///

[Karstedt]

The bug I encountered with the type 5 fusion plants was with the Talarians, not the Caldonians (I haven't secured their allegiance in my current game) like the other poster reported. Also, the Acamarians had type 7 hydroponic famrs when I acquired them.

Update: I just bribed the Andorians into the fold (away from the Romulans) and they too had type 5 fusion plants. They also had 41 Grav turbines though, and after scrapping the fusion plants they reverted to the Grav Turbines. It seems like it's always the Fusion Plant (as opposed to other energy structures) that that messes things up.

Just wondering, have you tried changing the industry plant upgrades to 4 or 6 to see if it avoids the not being able to upgrade from 4 to 5 with other races plants?

[Gowron]

After several games with each empire, I think that the extra system is a necessity in BoP. Founding a new colony is so time-consuming and expensive that I believe a T1 start with just the home system would be beyond tedious.

Well, I tested it and it was not overly tedious IMHO. Also there will be empty pop420 systems for smooth initial expansion

we have some questions regarding 1.1c in regards to 1.1a version:
1. what was the intention behind limiting the natural number of possible trade routes to 1?

After fixing the scrapping revenue, it turned out that trade routes would become too much of a decisive factor. To avoid this, both the effect and the numbers of trade routes had to be limited.

can't it be done some other way? like higher pop requirements per route?

Yep, but the pop requirement would have to so high that it would still result in just one trade route per system. Remember all additional starting systems have a high maximum population.

3. limiting diversity again by making starting systems of major empires look the same [number, type and pop on planets] - read: bad.

I don't like them to look the same either, but this was the only way to make them equal in size.
Unequally-sized additional starting systems had been one of the biggest balance problems in BotF multipleyer games, and if I have to choose between more diversity and better gameplay, then please understand that gameplay is more important in my opinion.

maybe making them diverse in small steps, like 5pop, 10pop... just so it doesn't appear overly generic?

Maybe possible, but they'd still look the same, since class M planets are required to bypass the problem of unsettled planets in additional starting systems.

The bug I encountered with the type 5 fusion plants was with the Talarians, not the Caldonians (I haven't secured their allegiance in my current game) like the other poster reported. Also, the Acamarians had type 7 hydroponic famrs when I acquired them.

Update: I just bribed the Andorians into the fold (away from the Romulans) and they too had type 5 fusion plants. They also had 41 Grav turbines though, and after scrapping the fusion plants they reverted to the Grav Turbines. It seems like it's always the Fusion Plant (as opposed to other energy structures) that that messes things up.

OK, looks very much like the known bug, since only Cardassian structures are affected. So this bug will be gone in the next version

Just wondering, have you tried changing the industry plant upgrades to 4 or 6 to see if it avoids the not being able to upgrade from 4 to 5 with other races plants?

You mean 4 resp. 6 upgrade levels?
This would work if they were lined up as tech 1 trough tech 4, resp. tech 1 through tech 6.
I'm thinking about something like this, but the problem is that relatively advanced industry structures would be available at relatively low tech levels, so the whole industry output dynamics will have to be revisited. It's on my to-do list.

[Martok]

Out of curiosity, Gowron, any idea when you're going to be releasing the next update? I continue to enjoy BOP immensely, but I have to admit I'm also very interested in the changes proposed in the next version.


By the by: Playing as the Klingons definitely feels "better" now. The new K'tinga upgrade combined with being able to construct the Hall of Warriors on native colonies has been a big help.

[Gowron]

Out of curiosity, Gowron, any idea when you're going to be releasing the next update?

Very soon, it's almost finished

[Martok]

Awesome. Can't wait.

[Gowron]

Version 1.2 has been released


It contains an optional .exe with increased map dimensions.
(small: 35x26, medium: 40x30, large: 52x39)

Also, this is the first BoP version to feature three non-vanilla ship models: Siggi's Excelsior model and Thunderchero's K'Vort and Vulture models

Discovering the corner check made it possible to keep major empire starting systems away from the map edges instead, so now we can finally have 9 starting systems at the highest starting level

A change that might be interesting is the new look of ring galaxies. They will now just consist of one ring without the "usual" core. So for each empire, there will be only two other empires they have to deal with, for the most part.

There are also some balance changes.
Ramming will not be as strong as before, as the attacker will ALWAYS be destroyed by the collision.
Ship maintenance now folows an affine formula and will in general allow bigger fleets than before, while still giving small empires an edge (compared to a linear formula).
Technology costs have been increased (again) to slow down the tech race a bit.

The new version contains a fix for the bug relating to buildings in minor race systems.

[thunderchero]

Hi everyone,

I got Balance of Power 1.2 Multi installer ready.

this is the new installer that uses same main installer (1.0.2) as before.
but will install Balance of Power with dual install, normal maps and with Large maps. Some of you have already seen this installer with All the Ages mod. So this is nothing really new.

This version will give choice at beginning of install of language to install

installer size is 6.15mb

required hard drive space will be 630mb

Balance of Power 1.2
File size 6.15mb
hard drive space required 630mb

thunderchero

[Martok]

Yay!! Downloaded and installed.


I did already run into a bug, however:

When looking at certain ships in the tech screen, clicking on them causes the game to freeze up. I get the following error message: "Error: 222 C:\mpr\ddk\eng\State.c Mar 17 1999". When I clicked OK on the error message, it then brought up an app error saying "The instruction at "9x2000d96a" referenced memory at "0x01501348". The memory could not be "read"." It then tells me to click on OK to terminate the program, etc.

Ships affected by this bug: Federation Dreadnought III & IV; and Romulan Strike Cruiser I, II, III, & IV. Clicking on these ships in the regular system build queues does not cause any problems for me. It's only clicking on them in the technology screen that causes the freeze/crash.



Oh yeah, and I love the new/revised ships. The Excelsior, Vulture, and the revised K'Vort all look friggin' sweet.

[ketteringdave]

I just came back to report the same thing. The only difference I ran into was the detail: referenced memory at "0x09538720" - all other details match Martok's report.

I'm using the Multi-Install version.

[thunderchero]

Yay!! Downloaded and installed.


I did already run into a bug, however:

When looking at certain ships in the tech screen, clicking on them causes the game to freeze up. I get the following error message: "Error: 222 C:\mpr\ddk\eng\State.c Mar 17 1999". When I clicked OK on the error message, it then brought up an app error saying "The instruction at "9x2000d96a" referenced memory at "0x01501348". The memory could not be "read"." It then tells me to click on OK to terminate the program, etc.

Ships affected by this bug: Federation Dreadnought III & IV; and Romulan Strike Cruiser I, II, III, & IV. Clicking on these ships in the regular system build queues does not cause any problems for me. It's only clicking on them in the technology screen that causes the freeze/crash.



Oh yeah, and I love the new/revised ships. The Excelsior, Vulture, and the revised K'Vort all look friggin' sweet.

I was i a hurry and My install is vanilla "no hades" so when I checked ships it was ok

same link as before it is already uploaded. it is even a little smaller 6.15mb

thunderchero

[Martok]

Awesome. Thanks thunderchero!

[captaindusk]

*dribbles and rushes to download section*. I guess I gotta take some time to play since I still don't have much.

[goodone]

just 2 report a simple typo in docs: chapter 2.3.3, 2nd paragraf, 2nd sentence: 'theversion'.

it came 2 my observation that the author pays much attention to docs, and i rly respect that.

[Martok]

My thoughts/observations thus far (I've played around 130 turns in my Fed campaign (on the large maps), average difficulty, beginning civ level):


Tech progression feels better now; I'm not getting tech breakthroughs (seemingly) every other turn. It still goes along at a good enough pace, however -- I'm not tapping my foot impatiently waiting for the next breakthrough or anything.

I've yet to run into any minor races, although I'm not terribly surprised overall. I've only colonized or explored a little over two dozen systems thus far, which -- given that Gowron's (happily) increased the number of systems on the large maps -- means that I've probably not covered even a tenth of the galaxy yet. (If I manage to go through *another* two dozen systems without finding any minor races, then I'll be perplexed!) No real complaint here; I'm more just voicing out loud that I'm only now starting to realize/appreciate just how spread out the minor races really are on the larger maps.

I've been meaning to ask this for a while now: Does anyone feel colony ships maybe take just a hair too long to build early on? Even with a 25% morale bonus and a 75% tech bonus (I'm currently at Construction Tech 3), it still takes 6 turns for my shipyards at Sol to produce a single colony ship....on my colony worlds, they take even longer (as Sol is thus far my only system with Type 2 Mass Replicators). I know BOP is intended to cut down on "colony spamming" -- which, for the record, I fully applaud -- but I have to admit that taking 6 turns to construct a colony ship this far into the game still seems a bit too long a build time. Not that I want to be able to churn out colony ships every turn, but perhaps 4 or 5 turns instead of 6-7? Does anyone else think this, or am I just an impatient twit?

Apologies if this has been mentioned before: Has anyone else noticed that when you're building a Starbase right when you reach the tech for the next Starbase upgrade, your troop transport suddenly finishes building your Starbase that same turn (even if you only started building it the previous turn)? *And* that you don't lose your troop transport either? I know it's a minor issue, but I figured I should at least mention it.

The Excelsior is awesome! I love Excelsiors. So when are we going to get the Constitution as the Feds' Cruiser I? (Pretty please, with sugar on top?)


Anyway, that's all I got right now. I've seriously been playing BOP so much the last few days that this is the first time I've been able to tear myself away from the game long enough to make any substantial comment on it. Fantastic work as always Gowron; my hat's off to you.

[ketteringdave]

Apologies if this has been mentioned before: Has anyone else noticed that when you're building a Starbase right when you reach the tech for the next Starbase upgrade, your troop transport suddenly finishes building your Starbase that same turn (even if you only started building it the previous turn)? *And* that you don't lose your troop transport either? I know it's a minor issue, but I figured I should at least mention it.

This is a known bug from the original game. It may be more noticeable now, since more starbase upgrades means more opportunities for this to occur.

I haven't gotten too deep into a game yet, but I think this update looks very good, and I've enjoyed each version of the mod so far.