Useless Wonders

The concepts on both of these are good, but you are correct that they don't work. They both are available too late to do any good.

My suggestions:
-Have new anomolies pop up throughout the game

-Have Orbital Terraformers add new tiles that would not have been available above and beyond the currenty unuseable tiles.

-Have Orbital Terraformers add new tiles that would not have been available above and beyond the currenty unuseable tiles.

A good idea. Something along these lines will make the Terraforming wonder much more worth striving for, it's almost useless at the moment.

-Orbital Terraformers= all potentially un-useable tiles on your planet are instantly useable. Useless unless you just got an uninhabited planet. By the time you research this the tiles will already be useable.

Only if you actually build the improvements.

Agree the galactic guidebook is pointless. I have built it once when there were still some anomalies around, only to find out that what it ACTUALLY does is reduce the cost of the survey module to nothing. You still have to add the honking great thing to the ship. I WAS planning on letting my non-survey fleet snatch the last of the anomalies from under the AIs nose.

Orbital Terraformers ae actually more than useless if you play the neutral path as you get all the tiles opned up anyway.

Orbital Terriformers are ok, they help to upgrade all the squares on conquored planets.

Not a must have wonder though.

I agree about the Guidebook, but I find Orbital Terraformer to be incredibly useful, especially if I have enough cash to buy it outright. Doing so means I don't have to waste any turns of production terraforming tiles here and there on all my planets (it also means, as has been pointed out, that all conquered planets get an instant upgrade).

If you don't have enough cash on hand, and have to spend twenty turns building it, it's obviously a lot less useful.

I agree on Galactic Guidebook.

I really like StarWeb's suggestions for anomalies to occur during the game, and for terraforming to make new squares usable. I mean, isn't that what the classical definition of terraforming is about? Making unusable planetary surface usable? How about using it to make planets with NO habitable squares usable? Now there would be a Wonder-full thing!

StarWeb-- Did you ever play the Flying Buffalo PBM StarWeb game? It was a lot of fun.

Letting the orbital terraformer unlock otherwise un-unlockable tiles would make it extremely unbalanced. Even if it was just one extra tile per colony, they add up.

I think I said this before in a different topic, but I'll say it again. Galactic Guidebook isn't that great, but survey modules increase the sensor range of the ship they're mounted on by a bit, so this wonder is still good for something after all the anomalies have been explored. Having said that, Eyes of the Universe (or whatever it's called) is much better for increasing sensor range, but I suppose that on a high difficulty level one of the computer races might beat you to building it, so then having the GG would be better that nothing.

The Guide book is useless for conquored planets.
The population is so low that not all the tiles are used before the game ends.

I am usually too busy attacking other planets to waste time shipping in population.

if the guide book just adds the capability for all ships to survey, how is it useless for conquered planets when it doesn't do anything for your planets?

Agreed on the Galactic Guidebook, and somewhat agree on the Orbital Terraformer.

The Oribital Terraformer is somewhat useful at least to non-Neutral races.

The Galactic Guidebook is actual more worthless than you think. It doesn't give every ship the ability to survey, it just reduces the cost of the Survey Module to 0, thus making it free to add as many as you want..

Other worthless Wonders and Super Projects in my opinion:

Secret Police Center: Why the heck would one waste the time to build something that gives a +20% to morale on one planet when one can build a VR center? Maybe give it an empire wide affect?

Hyperion and Omega Planetary Defense Projects: Why build these when an Orbital fleet manager will suffice. Why build them at all when I just have enough fleets laying around to intercept ships before they can hit my planets since I want to be the attacker and thus fire first.

Political Capital: It's not bad, but it's basically a Cultural Exchange Center and Zero Gravity Arena all in one.

Micro-Repair Robots: 20% increased repair rate sounds nice, but it seems that it doesn't actually give a large enough bonus to be significant.

Galactic Privateer: Does it actually do anything?

Gravity Accelerators: Woohoo... +1 movement...

Hyperion Shipyard: Woohoo... another +1 movement... Why not make it a +10% to Hit points for ships built on planet, then I might actually build one!

Hall of Empathy: Might have an affect, but I have yet to see it.

On the other hand, here are some of my "must have" wonders:

Restaraunt of Eternity: Can't argue with a Civ. wide +20% to influence!

Galactic Bazaar and Galactic Showcase: A.I. tends to not delve to deep into diplomacy techs. With a +25% to Diplomacy and having your trade offers appear to be twice as valuable, you'd be surpised at the rediculous trades the A.I. will take.

Diplomatic Translators: Same as above, can trade for access to them if A.I. gets them first, so not that big of a deal, but it's nice to control them.

Tir-Quan Training: A +25% to soldiering is nice, but it isn't really a must have, just nice.

Xinthanium Hull plating: Easy +15% to H.P., can trade for, but also nice to own so A.I. can't have it if you don't want them to.

HyperComputers: Easy +20% to Research, same reasoning as above.

Any morale boosting Trade goods: Cheap (comparativly) civ. wide morale boosters, also makes a good trade item.

Emphatic Tactical Defense Center: Gotta love a free +30% to defense!

The Galactic Guidebook is actual more worthless than you think. It doesn't give every ship the ability to survey, it just reduces the cost of the Survey Module to 0, thus making it free to add as many as you want..

ok, but then what does Vulcan2's comment about the GG bieng useless for conquered planets is about when it gives NO planetary bonus whatsoever. Either he is talking about something else and mistyped or he doesn't know what he is talking about in the first place

what about the Alignment unlocked special projects such as the 'Temple of Rightousness' (sp?) and the 'Temple of Malice'? and the alignment based buildings like the neutrality learning center which I know gives a huge research bonus, but what about the others.

and I think Galactic Privateer may be bugged as I've seen ppl complaining about that it doesn't seem to work right.

Hi,

I find the Orbital Transformers useful. Because the AI is not as aggressive as it might be, I often have time to beeline to Terraforming, after building the Diplomatic Translators, the Restaurant of Eternity and Xinathium Plating. This path gives me Aphrodisiacs, which will turbocharge my growth, and then the Transformers. I refrain from upgrading any squares, pumping the unused social production into more colony ships and constructors.

Aphrodisiacs are awesome when gotten early. +50% pop fuels economic growth, colony spamming, influence and eventually planetary invasion. It's worth 4 or 5 racial points, and cannot be gotten any other way.

I like the Aphrodisiacs so much that I avoid neutral alignments. I find neutrality less useful because I can get one of the two major benefits this way. I'll miss out on the neutrality learning centers in favor of the immediate benefits of Evil. In a way, the whole Aphrodisiac/Evil thing makes sense: Girls *so* go that bad boy image.

Priorities:

1) Get easy techs that increase production, while spamming colony ships. (Gal Militarization, Planetary Improvements...)

2) Research speed techs until Impulse Drive, for faster colony ships.

3) Sensors, for fast cargo-based survey ship.

4) Yellow techs to get better economy, diplomacy, +10% morale, Diplo Translators and Restaurant. This path also lets me start trading for other technologies, once the translators are built.

5) Research toward Xinathium.

6) Terraform track.

Oddly enough, I can usually trade for good technology, even weapons tech. The Drengin are especially cooperative with me in this regard, glad to trade with their evil buddy.

Suggested game change: It should be impossible to receive any technology in trade, without first having all prerequisites.

Suggested game change: A race should boycott all trading (not Trade) with races toward whom they feel cool or worse, except as part of a peace agreement.

Note: In 1.1, the military production pick is awesome! I get +50% for 4 points. This boosts both my economy (free military production) and capacity to build ships, which I will be doing all game, but especially in the beginning. Because buildings become active the turn they are bought, whereas ships do not appear until the next turn, I gain turn advantage when I use starting cash to build industrial buildings whose production is devoted to building ships. I'm a little slower off the mark than the guys who buy a colony ship first, but this matters less in 1.11. I catch up within two or three turns and pull ahead. My economy never tanks.

Favored racial picks: 4 for military, 4 for economy, 3 for morale. Industrialist party.

Favored game: Tough (all Intelligent; I like a level playing field against a fully-enabled AI), Large (larger galaxies are just *too* big, and the UI quickly becomes cumbersome as I have too many planets to manage), 7 opponents (I want the AI to fill up the space so I don't), everything abundant (I enjoy anomalies, I want the AI to have lots of habitable planets, though I've also tried reducing #stars to common, because I still find myself with too many planets to manage :/).

Favorite Races: Anyone who starts with miniaturization. Custom is nice because I can start out with techs that give me production bonuses, but *not* with Xeno Industrial Theory: Basic Factories get me going much faster than Factories.

Anyway,

Ken

*err, why can't I edit my previous post???*

anyway, I take back what I said about that Vulcan2 doesn't know what he/she is talking about because his medals show that he has done a good deal of games. of course though, some clarification about what he meant would be nice.

Secret Police Center: Why the heck would one waste the time to build something that gives a +20% to morale on one planet when one can build a VR center? Maybe give it an empire wide affect? Hyperion and Omega Planetary Defense Projects: Why build these when an Orbital fleet manager will suffice. Why build them at all when I just have enough fleets laying around to intercept ships before they can hit my planets since I want to be the attacker and thus fire first. Micro-Repair Robots: 20% increased repair rate sounds nice, but it seems that it doesn't actually give a large enough bonus to be significant. Galactic Privateer: Does it actually do anything? Gravity Accelerators: Woohoo... +1 movement... Hyperion Shipyard: Woohoo... another +1 movement... Why not make it a +10% to Hit points for ships built on planet, then I might actually build one!

You are 100% right on the secret police HQ, but the two defense wonders combine with the Spin Control Center pretty much prevents you from ever being declared on. 10 ships at 2x health, in one fleet, with each ship appearing 5x stronger = Peace anyone?

The repair bots are actually nice with LARGE ships. They're nigh worthless if you're a fighter fan, but with battleships or dreadnaughts they're quite handy.

The Gravity accelerators ARE handy, and so is the shipyard if you have room for it on an suped up industrial planet w/ starbases.

Privateer, eh.... Not much of a use, but it is worth getting just to prevent an enemy from getting it.

I agree with StarWeb about the anomolies popping throughout the game. ORRR..... The GG would give you a anomolie farm where, in your space, anomolies pop up from time to time. When the anomolies would pop up your ships would snatch it up. F.Y.I. if anomolies popped up from time to time, the GG would increase the pop-ups in your space by alot.

P.S.: If anomolies did pop up, I would like to have it as a option not for them to pop up.

StarWeb-- Did you ever play the Flying Buffalo PBM StarWeb game? It was a lot of fun.

Still do. I've been at at least one of their games at any given moment for more than 15 years. While I love computer games, there is still something special about waiting two weeks to see the results of a turn versus more than a dozen other human opponents that all move simultaneously. None of the "you move and then I move" issue you see in many turn based strategy games. And real human opponents always seem to do something unexpected.

You are 100% right on the secret police HQ,

Secret policce is very usefull, however the description is very bad.
Lets say you have a plane wiht 25b people and 5 vr centers without any boni
Morale would be:
100% -80% for 25b people..... Thats your new base morale
+5*25% (or how much is VR?) from the remaining 20% base morale
=45% morale

secret police adds to base morale
so 1SP+4 VR
100%-80% for population
+20% for SP
=40%
+4*25% from 40%
=80%

you see the difference
But the descripion is REALLY bad

Yeah, some of the descriptions do more harm than good. I am often not really sure what the benefit of a building or upgrade is or where certain bonuses are applied. I am really looking forward to implementing the Galactopedia or a something similar in the next update. they want to do that, don't they? thought I read it in some post.
and please add more detailed descriptions to the tech tree!

The best wonder in the game, in my opinion, has to be the MIND CONTROL CENTER!!!!!

When it gives you a 100% boost to economy, you can't go wrong!!!