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

Balance of Power Mod; showcase and support/discussion/questions/suggestions/reviews

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Martok
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Post by Martok »

Thanks tc. Much obliged. :)
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Gowron
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Post by Gowron »

Version 1.2c is now available for download :)


This time, there are two major changes: new late-game ships and a new ship support model.

Every empire can now build a special high-end ship easily identifiable by being the only ship to require a level 10 in Computers technology (which is the most expensive tech now). These new ships are not connected to the other upgrade lavels by auto-upgrades, and their construction costs are higher that those of their predecessors, while their support costs are lower. Apart from having good battle stats, each of the new ships has been given a certain bonus:

- The Cardassian Cruiser VI sports doubled shield regeneration as well as speed 3, finally giving the Cardassians an edge in terms of speed.

- The Federation can build an upgraded version of the Defiant, which is equipped with a cloaking device.

- The Heavy Marauder is the first and only ship in BoP to reach speed 4.

- The Klingon Heavy Cruiser V features bonused accuracy and defense ratings, equaling the defense value of a Defiant (the new one!) and surpassing the accuracy of even a Borg Cube.

- Last but not least, the new Strike Cruiser V of the Romulan Empire had its minimum torpedo range reduced by 80%, making it much less vulnerable in close-quarters combat.


Apart from that, a new upgrade level has been inserted into the Galor line. It requires techs 3/4/4/4/5/4 and reaches speed 2, granting the Cardassians earlier access to fast cruisers.


Maintenance costs will now decrese as you make your way through the upgrade levels of a ship class. For example, a Federation Cruiser, which required 229 credits per turn in version 1.2b (regardless of upgrade level), will now have an upkeep of 235/222/209/195/175 credits per turn (levels I through V).

But that's not the only change to ship support. There's a whole new formula for the free ship support value. It's no longer a fixed threshold, but rather a variable percentage of your total ship support cost. This percentage starts close to 100% if your fleet is very small compared to your population. As the fleet grows bigger, the free support value grows as well, but the free support percentage drops. For *very* large fleets, the free support approaches a value that equals about two times the former (fixed) free support as in v1.2b.

The main effects are that
- unlike before, even small fleets will already drain some credits, and
- large fleets will be much cheaper to maintain than before.

See below for the exact free support formula if you're interested.


Minor races now start with a number of orbital batteries that depends on their energy and weapon tech levels. So indirectly the number depends on the starting levels of the major empires, i.e. minors in "tech 9" games will be much better defended than minors in "tech 1" games.


The new update also contains fixes for the Federation Redeploy Display Bug (thanks to thunderchero), the Domination victory population percentage, and the morale overflow bug (thanks for both to Spocks-cuddly-tribble).



Step-by-Step Calculation of Free Ship Support in v1.2c

1. There's an empire-specific support factor. It's 3.75 for the Cardassians, 4 for the Federation, 3 for the Ferengi, 4.75 for the Klingons, and 4.5 for the Romulans.

2. Calculate the effective population number by
[effective population] = ([total population] + 1500) * [empire-specific support factor]

3. Calculate the free ship support value by
[free ship support] = [effective population] * [total support cost] / ([effective population] + [total support cost])


Note that the free support value will be close to the total support cost if the total support cost is very low compared to the effective population, and on the other hand it will be close to the effective population number if the total support cost is very high (again, compared to the effective population).
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Flocke
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Post by Flocke »

Wow, great update! :D
And you're back just in time! Wonderful. :twisted:
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Post by thunderchero »

KrazeeXXL
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Post by KrazeeXXL »

nice work Gowron :D

Now as the weather becomes (stays) bad a new BOP version is an awesome move, Chancellor :D

and thx to tc for his incredibly fast "conversion" into a multi mod :D
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krazyk
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Post by krazyk »

I'm having some trouble getting the program to run. It's been a while but I installed the 1.0.2 and then the Balance of Power. When I run it it flashes for a bit then and goes from full screen to windowed and I see just the title bar about two inches long in the upper right. I can't get it restored or closed without task manager. Any ideas?
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Post by krazyk »

This is what I'm saying.
Besides the html not liking my link.
You have to cut and paste.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2 ... =fbx_album
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Post by KrazeeXXL »

not everyone has a facebook account.

to your problem.

1. deinstall everything BotF related
2. install main multi 1.02 (you'll find it in the download section)
3. install BOP 1.2c multi ver

voilá
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krazyk
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Post by krazyk »

http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x38/ ... titled.png

Do you need a account to view that photo?
I used the direct link, so that one wouldn't need an account to view it.
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Post by goodone »

yup, u need an account. and yup, not everyone has one [me very proud about that]. :D
iNqUIrY: whO ArE yOU?! Image
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KrazeeXXL
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Post by KrazeeXXL »

a first "quick" assessment to the new 1.2c.

started two games so far. one 2p (captaindusk and me) and a 3p game (Flocke, captaindusk and me). had to stop playing the 3p game in fact of constant crashing. :/
but the 2p game with cd and me is still running. We're at turn 80ish so far of a pretty interesting game. And also a quite hard one, too. Had ca. 5 crashes so far.

The settings of our game are t3, normal large maps, random=off, minors=many, impossible and no timer. CD's playing as feds, me as kling.
CD's position is in the upper left and mine in the upper right. Between us are in the upper mid the Rom and in the middle the card.

I would call Rom and card my two special friends as they declared war on me out of neutrality and started inteling me the whole time. Now in turn 80 I got all in all 2k points on internal security and finally 1k on research.

Have to say that the AI is quite stronger then it used to be. :) Perhaps its because I didn't play a serious game for 8 months but honestly...I don't think so. ;)

Good Job Gowron!

To the ship support costs:

you can't build tons of ships anymore w/o watching the costs. You're forced to found new colonies to maintain bigger fleets. This makes the game tougher then b4. Well thought by our Chancellor. It's finally about economic sustainability. As it always should've been (imo).

As b4: scrap is almost useless, it's better to build something else in the meantime, then wasting time building cs.
Also: the AI seems to build a good mixture of ships. Much big ones and a good amount of small ones, too.


Minors: hard to get them. you have to spend lots of credits to get a minor even friendly. There might be a difference between the majors but as I've seen in our game, captaindusk (fed) also didn't get a single minor as yet ;)

Can't tell anything about invasions yet. The card got 3 minors as yet through it so it seems at least possible ;)

One thing I dislike in BOP is the scan range of some ships. Beside the yridian scouts which are now useless, B'rels which are supposed to be scouts, too, could need a scan range of 2 imo (now 1). As it now is, they're just the fast attack support in my fleet. nothing more - nothing less. I'm actually guarding my borders with heavy cruiser or heavy destroyer which have at least a scan range of 2. Normally I don't care about to lose a scout but such a big ship is indeed a big loss.


Had a funny situation as I wanted to scare the Rom off as he was building a starbase in my front garden. So I took 3 heavy cruiser to attack them. The card also was present in this battle. As I seen a big Romulan fleet with at least 12 warbird II and lots of dd II's I retreated (was cloaked).

The funny and a bit strange thing was that my Commanders were yelling "IT'S A TRAP" I lmao thinking about Admiral Ackbar :lol: and still while in tactical combat I got a msg that my ships were destroyed (then I hit ok). Can't remember if they warped outta the area and because of the msg I thought I've lost them. Some ships shot each others, some warped out but I didn't seen which ones as it was too much zoomed in.

The strange thing was that after the battle I saw all my heavy cruisers uncloaked and happy lurking around in the neighboursystem. :)

Must've been the card who's ships were destroyed in the battle (but rom and cards have at least a friendship).

Never got this "Es ist eine Falle - it's a trap" msg b4. Was funny but the result: a bit strange though.
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Post by KrazeeXXL »

to the ship support costs: We played a 3p game on T4 today and compared to T3 its a difference. ships are cheaper in maintenance (you start on techlevel 8 8O ) and you can produce lots of them as you might've been used to it. Have to check this ship support cost feature out a bit more.

it's somehow different as I'm used to it (not in a bad way though)
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Post by krazyk »

Negative ghost rider.

I still have the goofy lines across.
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Post by thunderchero »

krazyk,

do you get same problem on vanilla?

what OS are you using?

if windows 7 you should start posting on this thread last poster is having same problem as you.

viewtopic.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=1289

Also there is no need to post in balance of power thread if this problem is not related to BOP.

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Post by Gowron »

Martok wrote:Something else I've been meaning to mention for a long time now (I don't know why I keep forgetting):



While the morale penalty from Forced Labor Farms works as it should, the same does not appear to be the case with the morale bonus from Private Farms. There's one (partial) exception to this rule -- the Private Farm's morale bonus does appear to negate the morale penalty from Forced Labor Farms; however, this only applies if you're playing as the Cardassians (since they're the only empire that can build both structures).

In essence, unless you're the Cardassians, the only benefit you appear to get from building Private Farms is the food bonus. I'm not sure why its morale bonus doesn't seem to function properly, but it looks like it either needs to be fixed, or -- if that's not feasible -- then its build cost should probably be reduced. Right now, there's no way Private Farms are worth 1000 credits, unless you're the Cardies (and maybe not even then).




I realize that's a very minor nitpick, but I'd feel remiss if I didn't at least mention it. I'm still enjoying BOP immensely; the galaxy is currently trembling before the might of my Klingon Empire! 8)


EDIT: I also recall the morale bonus from Private Farms not working correctly in vanilla BOTF either. Is this hard-coded, perhaps?
Private Farms give +1 morale, but this alone is not enough to increase the morale of a system beyond 100 points. You can test it this way:
Start a game playing as the UFP, at maximum tech level. Power up the Federation Council, and build Private Farms in one of your secondary systems. Don't do anything else (except for pressing "turn done" repeatedly ^^). Now the morale value in that system should increase up to 119 points, while the morale of the other secondary systems should stay at 100.
thunderchero wrote:Balance of Power 1.2c Multi installer

thunderchero
Thanks a lot, thunderchero :)
krazyk wrote:http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x38/ ... titled.png

Do you need a account to view that photo?
I used the direct link, so that one wouldn't need an account to view it.
That's the ultimate Dominion Mod, not Balance of Power ;)

Also, it does not really look like a mod-related issue, but rather like a graphics or compatibility problem.
KrazeeXXL wrote:a first "quick" assessment to the new 1.2c.

started two games so far. one 2p (captaindusk and me) and a 3p game (Flocke, captaindusk and me). had to stop playing the 3p game in fact of constant crashing. :/
but the 2p game with cd and me is still running. We're at turn 80ish so far of a pretty interesting game. And also a quite hard one, too. Had ca. 5 crashes so far.
Well, I'll keep my fingers crossed for you. It's a shame that BotF is so unstable in multiplayer.
KrazeeXXL wrote: As b4: scrap is almost useless, it's better to build something else in the meantime, then wasting time building cs.
Yep, actually producing trade goods (1 credit per 7 industry points) is more efficient than scrapping ships (1 credit per 8 industry points) in BoP.
KrazeeXXL wrote:One thing I dislike in BOP is the scan range of some ships. Beside the yridian scouts which are now useless, B'rels which are supposed to be scouts, too, could need a scan range of 2 imo (now 1). As it now is, they're just the fast attack support in my fleet. nothing more - nothing less. I'm actually guarding my borders with heavy cruiser or heavy destroyer which have at least a scan range of 2. Normally I don't care about to lose a scout but such a big ship is indeed a big loss.
The B'rel is not a scout in BoP, it's merely a cheap destroyer. Poor scan range is a Klingon weakness. Only the Vor'cha class gets a scan range 2. Their cloak can save them from punishment, unless you're scouting the Romulans.
KrazeeXXL wrote:Had a funny situation as I wanted to scare the Rom off as he was building a starbase in my front garden. So I took 3 heavy cruiser to attack them. The card also was present in this battle. As I seen a big Romulan fleet with at least 12 warbird II and lots of dd II's I retreated (was cloaked).

The funny and a bit strange thing was that my Commanders were yelling "IT'S A TRAP" I lmao thinking about Admiral Ackbar :lol: and still while in tactical combat I got a msg that my ships were destroyed (then I hit ok). Can't remember if they warped outta the area and because of the msg I thought I've lost them. Some ships shot each others, some warped out but I didn't seen which ones as it was too much zoomed in.

The strange thing was that after the battle I saw all my heavy cruisers uncloaked and happy lurking around in the neighboursystem. :)

Must've been the card who's ships were destroyed in the battle (but rom and cards have at least a friendship).

Never got this "Es ist eine Falle - it's a trap" msg b4. Was funny but the result: a bit strange though.
Really strange ^^
A discovery consists in seeing something everybody has seen and at the same time thinking something nobody has thought yet.
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