Krynn Super Ability is unbalanced.

Your title needs work...For a moment I thought you were saying superspy was good...

Totally agree. Superspy is probably the weakest super abilty. The counter esp center is nice, but it's expensive to build early in the game. Maybe if every planet got a free CEC, then superspy would be decent.

You know I haven't used the counter espionage center. I will have to focus on building one next game. What do you personally feel is the stronger game... Galactic Civilizations 2 or Civilizations 4? Now Civ 4 has two sweet expansion packs, but for me building a library and only having like 15 different attack units is lame compared to the Sci Fi aspects of Gal Civ. Being Klingon's and soon having their own technology like slave pits (enterprise's captain archer was in one of those). At the same time having different civilizations go to war over your religion is pretty tight too, and having the ability to influence states that have your state religion. To counter that thought Galactic Civilization has the sweet birth acceleration and planetary habitat and improvements. What is your opinion, maybe you can seal the deal.

The Iconians and Korx tend to get the short end of the stick too... though I've personally been able to pull of some really effective early trade strats with the Korx.

Well if you put back in the army combat features of civ2, and brought back the unit bombard (outside city), hmmm and put in the unit design and some of the terraforming features of Alpha Centauri, then Civ4 would be better, much better! As it is now, Galciv is better.

I'd like to see all of the super abilities made more competitive with each other. It's a shame that almost everyone chooses Super Breeder, just like almost everyone chooses morale/economic bonuses. Some balancing is needed, IMHO.

However, of all the AIs, the Krynn perform consistently well in my games, despite their lackluster special ability.

Yeah the Krynn are definitely a force to reckon with as far as their AI, but playing them seems like a disadvantage. Everyone hates you no ones scared of you, your poor, and espionage needs to be tweaked to be affective. I've also had KORX AI kick me down the street, but they have a relatively weak Super Ability. I mean it's stronger then the espionage, and it's really cool to have all trade abilities, but it tends to be weaker then the other ones.

GalCiv 2 to me is better then Civ 4, because Civ 4 spends too much time on libraries and other projects. No matter how many different Civ's you play you are always trying to build the same stuff. Where as in GalCiv you have so many many many different combinations you need to play this game 50 times just hit all the combinations you want. Plus you get as many different War Vehicle's as you want (Although I prefer keeping a certain style in mind, like Star Trek does). Diplomatically there are more options in Civilization 4, but the GalCiv system is more fun to me. The math is easier. I think both are good games, but GalCiv 2 is superior.

Now if only they let you design mechs for the ground invasion.

I would agree galciv2 is superior to civ4, but Alpha Centauri is superior to both! Alpha Centauri is packed so full of wonderful features and game concepts i am suprised it isn't illegal!! Put a smart AI with it and set planet mind worm stacks to single unit damage only and i would have no need for other games.

In the interview linked on the main site page it is acknowledged that this is an issue and it is promised that Galciv 2.0 will rebalance super abilities.

Well, the AI in GalCiv2 puts up a bigger challenge and there seems to be more variation throughout the game. I couldn't choose between both games, each has its advantages.
I think a very strong point of Alpha Centauri is the extremely wide range of units and components available; I expect that with the next GalCiv2 expansion the unique techs per race will make GalCiv2 superior to Alpha Centauri even in that aspect.

I'm SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO pumped to get the new expansion pack. This AI is so superior to anything on the market right now. I can't lie and say that I possess a 360 or PS3, and I'm not sure what programmers are doing with Halo 3's AI. I do assume it's good. I haven't seen to many games work like this one though. I.E.

I have a game going on in a small galaxy, and with only a normal intelligence level. Well I sent in my super expensive, and decked out Troop Transports in ahead of my fleet. I figured that if I sent my Troop Transport fleet one way and sent my fleet straight for them they would go for the closest target. JUST LIKE EVERY strategy A.I. does with the exeception of SOME chess programs-(Given the choice between one rook dangerous one rook not dangerous). Well long story short they have been chasing my Troop Transports all over the galaxy for over 15 turns now. Not to mention the A.I. knows which Starbases are the weakest and most devastating to attack. Unless you put the A.I. on idiotic it does a very good job at being human.

BRAD WARDELL IF YOUR LISTENING!!! STOP IMPROVING THE A.I. YOUR GOING TO MAKE A SKYNET!! ACTUALLY I TAKE THAT BACK, BECAUSE I'LL JUST BRING MY LAPTOP INTO THE BOMB SHELTER AND PLAY GALCIV 2 WHILE THE ROBOT-HUMAN WARS ARE WAGED.

I disagree about Korx ability. I think it's overpowered in a small galaxy and underpowered in a larger one (which in itself is a problem - it's inconsistent) - with fewer planets to give revenue, the instant trade techs give you a chance to have a mid-game income vastly superior to your tax revenue if you can keep your freighters alive (which you can usually do since you can build privateer before anybody else). Early freighters give much more income mid-game than mid-game freighters.... Of course to make that strategy work you sort of need to pick one or two races and absolutely stay peaceful with them so war doesn't disrupt trade. Playing a diplomatic game on Tough, I had no trouble in a medium galaxy with semi-sparse planets keeping my income absolutely insane. I was getting 1k per turn from trade and around 750 from taxation. Smaller galaxies or fewer planets will yield even better results I'd expect.

I don't know about Krynn - the free spy is practically worthless, but I thought I recalled the counter espionage center being pretty sweet - no enemy agents and it gives a boost to morale. Wasn't it equivalent to the second-best morale building? So early game that seems like it could be nice. But I never play as Krynn so what the hell do I know?

Oh, GC2 totally kills Civ4. Economy is actually interesting. Bigger, more interesting tech tree without being overwhelming (very well-organized if you ask me). Strategy comes well before conquest. You can't produce military early on - you have to research a big tech before you can take over planets. You have to be insanely careful with your expansion or else you'll hit a debt you can't recover from. It's just a richer game in terms of the macro level decisions. I also like the spending sliders - it's like a real government, allocating X% to military, research, and the society. You can sort of override it per planet, but the government pretty much decides how important things are and individual colonies can only go so far outside that ruleset.

I can barely play "normal" strategy games anymore. They all feel so shallow. Build military. Expand. Kill enemy. Build more military. Expand more....