One change to ship range I'd like

Well, maybe life support systems can be mandatory in Galactic civilizations III, lets say if it is destroyed, everybody is going to die on your ship (well except the Yor). Happy now?

That has absolutely nothing to do with what I said. Literally absolutely.

You can mod life support ranges to your heart's content. That was true in GC2 and will almost certainly be true in GC3.

In this regard I'm a little lazy. I'll admit it.

I disagree with the OP -- one of the reasons for choosing a larger map was to make ship range technologies valuable, whereas smaller maps are for quick brawls and lets you skip that tech.

Can't we have fuel or something like it in GC3? I find it adds a lot of depth to the game, e.g. as in Distant Worlds. Of course it should not be too tedious.

I find this is a bit difficult to envision. After all, we are a long ways from 2178, and we have already discovered and collected antimatter. Do you have any theories on potential new fuel types?

Well anti-matter would need replacing, but I think something more logical would be something like "supplies" that encompasses food, ordnance, and fuel.

I think that's what "range" abstracts.  I don't think adding consumable fuel will improve the game.  GalCiv isn't Distant Worlds.

The only thing I'd change is the effect of starbases regarding range.

Starbase range extension should consider distance to the planet (or planets) that supply the base, so if you put your base at the limit of your range, you will be penalized (i.e.: reduce effect, increase maintenance cost). After all, supplying that base will be extremely difficult (akin of getting a constructor there for an upgrade)

Also starbases should have a more limited range extension than planets, like 20-30% of the range available for planets; bases need supplies to operate and the amount of supplies available to support starships/fleets will probably be less than the supply available from a planet.

In addition, chaining starbases should decrease the range extension, that way the starbase spam effect will be dealt with.

Without significant improvements in the ability to store antimatter, it isn't very useful as a fuel as it tends to only survive in our universe for a few fractions of a second. Moreover, you'd still eventually run out of your supply of antimatter, and since in any real system you'll require more energy to produce antimatter than you'll get out of the antimatter when using it as a fuel it would be impractical to have the ship fuel itself with an onboard antimatter production plant, unless it happens to take long stops at natural energy sources which can be used to power the antimatter generator.

Also, I would take some issue with "discovered and collected antimatter" - the situation is more that we've been able to artificially create antimatter after theorizing that such can exist, and we can keep it from destructively recombining with matter for short amounts of time. Since the process of creating antimatter consumes more energy than is released when the antimatter recombines with matter, it isn't a way to generate a perpetual motion machine, either, especially once you start to consider that in addition to the efficiency in the antimatter generation process you also need to consider the efficiency in the energy capture process during the matter-antimatter reaction, and that even though the matter-antimatter reaction is releasing lots of energy, it isn't necessarily releasing useful energy.

That being said, I'm not particularly unhappy with the way ship ranges are implemented in GCII. The only thing that I really wish were added would be some way of extending the range of ships so that I don't absolutely have to have X life support units on every ship in any given fleet. Does it make sense that I can put a ship out in space for decades without it ever even needing to pass within sensor range of a planet or a space station? Not particularly. On the other hand, most of the games that I've played which include a mechanic that forces you to bring ships back to supply points every so often are either too gentle about it (in which case the mechanic doesn't exist, for all intents and purposes) or too harsh (in which case the mechanic becomes an impediment to gameplay). In my opinion, Sword of the Stars did a good job of it, Distant Worlds and Starsector do an okay to poor job of it (especially Distant Worlds - relying on the computer to properly allocate resources usually works out, but it can be one hell of a problem when the computer's idea of what to prioritize doesn't match up with what you think should be a priority, and you don't really have a good way to influence those priorities), depending on what's going on in the game, and Sword of the Stars II as launched did a very poor job of it, which has since improved somewhat (still, having to return to port after more or less every battle isn't exactly conducive to my enjoyment of the game), but other people's views will differ, and that is one of the problems of balancing out this sort of system, because my opinion of where something becomes an impediment to gameplay is probably different from your opinion of the same, and it could be radically different.

I also tend to agree with jmontesi4 about the range-boosting effects of starbases - at some point, the amount of supplies required for the vessel carrying the supplies out to wherever the stuff is being sent should begin to exceed the value of actually getting the stuff there, especially if the supply vessels carry a live crew; using an automated vessel could potentially greatly extend the range, but you still need to get the personnel for the ships and stations out there in the first place, and it needs to be something that can be done within a reasonable time-frame given that at least some of the members of the starship or starbase crews have lives outside of their present jobs that they might want to return to at some point, and presumably there will always be some supplies which are in one way or another perishable. I don't necessarily agree that there's much point in adding it to the game given that in GCII we could make trade ships with speeds in the double digits and the maps weren't terribly large (on the order of a thousand light-years on edge, or ~260 parsecs on a side) with relatively high speeds relative to the scale of the map (up to about eight and a half thousand times the speed of light, or about 50 parsecs per week), if you really wanted to push ship speeds. More practically we might be looking at top-of-the-line ship speeds in the mid-teens to mid-twenties of parsecs per week, which should neveertheless allow for reasonably short travel times crossing the map.

I agree that on the really tiny maps, ship range should be almost a non-factor.

The problem is that on the immense maps, your default colony ship had a *huge* range.  Plus you could use starbases to extend your range.  Then there were the magical events that granted unlimited range.  Or the ability to stack "dozens" of range modules on your ship to get really long range ships.

• Ship range in GC2 needs to be a lot smaller at the basic level.
• Range modules need to be more expensive, or have exponential cost (or diminishing returns) as you add more then two to the hull.
• Unless a starbase is fitted out with a "resupply / refuel" module, it should not boost the ship range further then that provided by a nearby planet.

Right now, I have to play GC2 on Immense with "tight" clusters and "uncommon" number of stars to get the feel of gulfs between star clusters which are nearly uncrossable unless you invest in a starbase, fit more range modules, and the invest in better engine tech so you can get across that distance in a timely manner.

Otherwise, the map just feels too crowded and cluttered to me, with no sense of scale / wonder / terrain.

Joeball123 just made me think of an idea on compromise. Suppose we have a game even that is (toggle-able on/off at start) where your ships have a random event generator picked for <SOME NOT ALL> ships in your game and you get an event that says, "Crew of Heavy cruiser 435 want to take shore leave" 

You would get a message onscreen with an options to say ok and  that ship would divert to the nearest friendly base or planet and be out of your control for X number of turns. 

If you do allow this the returned ship gets a 50% increase in both combat effectiveness and range. If you choose to ignore the request the ship will take a 15% penalty for a year and then have a 50/50 chance of rebelling and becoming another empires ship....

Like I said this would be a toggle-able event which I would be happy to manage.

perhaps the range ain't very satisfying, but I am sure will all our ideals combined, we can make life support a mandatory life support system with all the changes you would get with a decent system. Or eliminate the ship component and then make the changes necessary for the community to be more satisfied with the system.

Ship range makes no sense. A ship can cruise out to its max range and stay there in the middle of deep space until a new engine tech is researched, upgrade itself in the middle of deep space, and then continue on to its next max range.

What?

Each ship should have a range that depends on fuel capacity like the system in Sword of the Stars. You run out of fuel, you’re dead in the water. Or, under the assumption these ships have some sort of reactor with long lived fuel source, don’t limit range, only limit speed.  If range is supposed to be a measure of supply limit, require that a ship return to a starbase or shipyard to refit.

While we're on the topic of shipyards, physical upgrades to ships should only be available at shipyards.  Allowing ships to upgrade themselves while in deep space is just silly.  If its a matter of software that can be transmitted via some kind of FTL communication, sure allow that, but youre not going to be refitting new engines or pwer sources in deep space.

Is the assumption that somehow there are thousands of tiny supply ships not seen onscreen that sip around within the range of all your ships refitting and supplying your ships?

 have ar simualar hread on this as well https://forums.galciv3.com/458393/page/1/#3500501

Ships don't use fuel, they use energy. Fossil fuels will have been obsolete for over a century in galciv.

Although its likely that supplies will not be fully self sufficient in recycling, and food (if you're organic) will run out. I think the yor should have unlimited range because they have no limitations beyond energy and time...plus I can't imagine Yor using life support, power generators maybe. But they should be a formality because the yor should easily go twice as far as a organically run one,and have more space too!

Fuel doesn't have to mean fossil fuels.  Even in a theoretical antimatter reaction, something ought to be consumed. You'd need to replenish those reactors eventually with whatever was feeding that reaction, though with fission or fusion as a model that can be a very long time.

So if range is a factor of logistical supply, why can a ship simply park itself at the end of its range forever without returning to a starbase, planet or shipyard?  Are there hundreds of little map-invisible supply drones running around supplying ships right up to the ships range limit?  And once again, how is it that a ship can upgrade itself in the middle of deep space and then suddenly have more range without returning to some sort of base for refit?

Yes, fus(s)ion...that's what I meant...

Many have said that it should only happen on Starbases and planets including ones of allies. I agree with that believe like a chocolate chip cookie dough and cinnamon milk shake is my favorite.