Well guys, i've almost made it through a complete game without any crashes. I have about three planets left to conquer in a game with no surrendering enabled and it hasn't hung up yet. I'd consider that to be a pretty good accomplishment. I did have one extreme slowdown in the game but that was related to my power settings (game laptop power cord came unplugged and it defaulted to battery saver mode). Here's a few more thoughts on Test Edition Beta 0.77.276618:
Adversary A.I.: It's crazy how quickly your adversaries learn their tech in relation to how fast players do, even in easy mode. Once I start tech trading with other races, they've far outpaced me in tech research most of the time. Also, your adversaries cling onto their techs tenaciously, even for minor tech upgrades later in the game. For example, say I ignore a minor weapons upgrade like kinetic weapons studies and focus on beam weapons, but later in the game I want that initial tech upgrade and attempt to trade an adversary for it. I'm assuming because it's a military tech, even though it might be a level 2 tech, adversaries want an arm and a leg for it or will just refuse to trade for it. I'd rather see a little more leniency on low level tech trading. Maybe make it where alliances are more lenient to trade low level military mid-game. I'd also like to see a little more weight added to open borders and exploration treaties. I'm constantly asked for them in diplomatic discussions but other species don't give you enough for them. These are two items that should cost you an arm and a leg to get and the same value goes for when adversaries ask for them. If they want them, they have to give up more than just helios ore and credits to get them.
Factions: I'd love to see a little higher percentages of advantages/disadvantages given in the factions for assigned recruits. Assigning people to the factions is expensive and i'd just like to see a slightly higher "bang for the buck." I like how the factions are different based on the player species. This part is great. Also, there's no way to give an assigned citizen a harmony crystal from the factions table once they've been assigned. You have to un-assign them to give them the crystal, then re-assign them to the faction to do it whereas on the other screens (minister, governor, etc.) you just have to click on the citizen for the popup with the harmony crystal to pop up.
Ship upgrades: They're better but i'd rather see the ship upgrades limited to one upgrade for each ship for the top three. I can still continually add crew quarters, command bridges and sensor arrays to small probe and exploration ships with no apparent limit on the number of times for the top three upgrades. Why a probe or a ship would need more than one command bridge is beyond me.
Poor planets: Also better and easier to hang onto now. One of my strategies is to just place low level ships like armed shuttles in orbit defending poor planets and never giving them a governor. I'm only assigning governors to level ten and above planets and this seems to work well for planet retention. The constant population planet revolting on poor planets in foreign territories seems to be mitigated by doing this.
Tech: The sheer volume of different techs is daunting and there's no possible way to learn all of the techs throughout the game. Perhaps it might be more beneficial to gameplay if the techs were tightened up a bit and streamlined to any given particular species. For example, Yor have no need for planetology, but it's still a tech that must be acquired for Yor reproduction. Medical upgrades are also unnecessary for a mechanical species but they're still there and researchable. I'd love to see the techs a little more streamlined for the individual player species, and perhaps a few unique techs that only being a specific species will unlock or after adding a new species to your planetary populace. For example, Bartock Grove are a plant based life form and all of their tech could focus on organic-type tech initially. Maybe their ships have to be "grown" instead of manufactured per se and their food upgrades are based on photosynthetics instead of farms. Adding another race to your planet/culture might unlock specific techs geared just to that race, too. I.e.: The more races you have, the more techs you unlock rather than the ability to research so many techs from the get go.
Planet governance: Much easier now with the removal of the individual control options per planet. I'm no longer constantly draining control points on quashing rebellions, law enforcement and artificially inflating planet morale. I'm also liking the extra options for tile additions/upgrades that you've added to the game. Even if it just boosts a planet from poor to marginal, it makes a big difference.
Culture points: Honestly, I don't really use the mini-missions in the game at all to unlock culture points. For example, the "wave" mini mission where you're supposed to survive x number of turns as everyone's worst enemy. In one game, that was set to 200 turns, which is a long time to go as a war target with no trading options. 20 turns would be more reasonable. Also, there's still no way to complete a mini-mission that's dependent upon research if you've already completed that tech to solve the mini mission. I'm thinking of the germ outbreak mission where you have to research a certain number of medical techs for a cure. If you've already researched the techs, you can't complete the mini mission and it sits there unresolved. Some of the other missions also involve too many steps to make it worth my while for the culture point.
