You probably couldn't colonize those planets because their hazard rating was outside of your race's tolerable range. On the left side of the Strategic Screen there is a great deal of planet info. Hazard rating and cost to colonize are the most important two when you are prospecting new planets.
Check the wiki http://sots.rorschach.net/. There are sample game starts and plenty of useful info. The manual that was boxed with the game is also pretty helpful.
That's the point, really. The UI never explained why the ship couldn't colonize, nor what was necessary in order to make the planet habitable. That's the most glaring example of the problem. Much of the empire interface worked the same way...
Well, if you keep in mind that your race's HR tolerance is random and that the range of planets you can colonise expands as you research more industrial or biological technology, it's really not quite as straightforward as "you need to research X and Y before you can colonise size 4 planets" or whatever. In fact there are often planets that no races in your game can colonise, but you can still stripmine them with later techs, giving you a oneshot production bonus and slightly increasing the resources at the planet you unload on.
Once you get that it's more of Spaceward Ho! in 3D with RTS-like battles, rather than Civ in space, the game seems a lot more intuitive. Frankly I don't have patience for many other 4x games now, even though SotS is currently light on trade and diplomacy.
So after playing for 5 hours last night I think the game is pretty good ... it's complicated though and abit slow.
I feel like I'm right on the edge of "getting it" but I still can't figure out how research works.
For 20 bucks I dont' regret the purchase and I want to try multiplayer post haste. I bet the game's fun level increases by a million when playing against real live prey.
Research is interesting. It doesn't hotkey, so you have to select the tech then push research to make your choice. The research slider controls how much of your empire's spare cash is going to savings, (which you need to build ships) and how much into your current research project.
Research works on a bell curve that centres on 100%. Sometimes you'll get a tech at 50%, sometimes at 150%. So you can't entirely predict when it's gonna finish and plan around the estimate. Kinda like real science.
Also, most of the techs in the game are on a random draw. So you can't rely on finding just one overpowered tech, and you have to be able to experiment and use different technologies to your advantage.
Well the expansion came out on gamersgate yesterday and so far i'm having a blast with it, slaves + grappling hook ships = win. Anyone else on these boards still play/planning on picking this up?
This is one hell of a necro post, but I wanted to ask a question, and I'd rather ask here than go to the bother of signing up/searching SotS's official forums.
So late in the game things can get pretty hectic and jumbled when looking upon the galaxy map, it can be difficult to spot things. Like enemy fleets inbound to one of your planets. Is there anywhere in the game where it will list enemy fleets you've detected which are inbound or do you have to just jet around the place every turn looking to make sure you didn't miss anything?
As far as I know, there is no hotkey to select / center camera on enemy fleets in strategic. Feel free to check the key-mapping options in-game or in the config files, I may be mistaken.
There are some display options [available on the button to the left of the news ticker] that might help, such as toggling star brightness or fleet lines. Selecting the Political map view [the one with colored blobs for colonized territory] and then selecting the Military option that appears in the lower-right will halo fleets with their empire's color. The size of the halo represents the distance that fleet can cover in one turn, while the intensity represents the number of ships. I don't know what happens if an enemy fleet includes a jammer to prevent you from knowing the number of ships in a fleet.
The History tab [part of the Empire Summary, accessed by clicking on the budget pie-chart] has a record of all news messages for the past several turns [like 10 or 20], which includes spotting new hostile fleets, but that is unwieldy to sort through.
When an enemy fleet is first spotted incoming, you can add a Note to their destination system, which places a flashing ! over that system, and a mark on the note icon in the Colonies or Explored Systems list in the Empire Summary. Text describing the incoming threat can be added to the note as desired.
This particular problem has been noted in an official forums Suggestions thread.
Smaller or differently-shaped maps can reduce late-game chaos.
tl;dr: Nothing that's exactly what you are looking for, but there are some options to limit or re-jumble the Strategic information. ;-)
Thanks, I already make use of some of the suggestions you listed, but yeah, the best map type to limit this 'chaos' is the 2D one, though that gives Tarkas, Liir, and Hivers severe disadvantages as their slower direct movement types suffer when their homeworlds are not surrounded in a sphere of viable planets.
Double and necropost, but the 2nd expansion for this game, A Murder of Crows, was just released and seems to offer a pretty extensive feature list. (new race, new drive tech, new weapons, structures, defense manager, population manager, sections, espionage & tech)
I have it ordered, anyone here have it to offer a verdict?
Posts
Well, if you keep in mind that your race's HR tolerance is random and that the range of planets you can colonise expands as you research more industrial or biological technology, it's really not quite as straightforward as "you need to research X and Y before you can colonise size 4 planets" or whatever. In fact there are often planets that no races in your game can colonise, but you can still stripmine them with later techs, giving you a oneshot production bonus and slightly increasing the resources at the planet you unload on.
Once you get that it's more of Spaceward Ho! in 3D with RTS-like battles, rather than Civ in space, the game seems a lot more intuitive. Frankly I don't have patience for many other 4x games now, even though SotS is currently light on trade and diplomacy.
Research is interesting. It doesn't hotkey, so you have to select the tech then push research to make your choice. The research slider controls how much of your empire's spare cash is going to savings, (which you need to build ships) and how much into your current research project.
Research works on a bell curve that centres on 100%. Sometimes you'll get a tech at 50%, sometimes at 150%. So you can't entirely predict when it's gonna finish and plan around the estimate. Kinda like real science.
Also, most of the techs in the game are on a random draw. So you can't rely on finding just one overpowered tech, and you have to be able to experiment and use different technologies to your advantage.
If you're familiar with dealing with game cameras like Homeworld's, it's pretty intuitive. I know that's not everyone's thing of course.
I like the game as it's an interesting mixture of simplicity and complexity.
So late in the game things can get pretty hectic and jumbled when looking upon the galaxy map, it can be difficult to spot things. Like enemy fleets inbound to one of your planets. Is there anywhere in the game where it will list enemy fleets you've detected which are inbound or do you have to just jet around the place every turn looking to make sure you didn't miss anything?
There are some display options [available on the button to the left of the news ticker] that might help, such as toggling star brightness or fleet lines. Selecting the Political map view [the one with colored blobs for colonized territory] and then selecting the Military option that appears in the lower-right will halo fleets with their empire's color. The size of the halo represents the distance that fleet can cover in one turn, while the intensity represents the number of ships. I don't know what happens if an enemy fleet includes a jammer to prevent you from knowing the number of ships in a fleet.
The History tab [part of the Empire Summary, accessed by clicking on the budget pie-chart] has a record of all news messages for the past several turns [like 10 or 20], which includes spotting new hostile fleets, but that is unwieldy to sort through.
When an enemy fleet is first spotted incoming, you can add a Note to their destination system, which places a flashing ! over that system, and a mark on the note icon in the Colonies or Explored Systems list in the Empire Summary. Text describing the incoming threat can be added to the note as desired.
This particular problem has been noted in an official forums Suggestions thread.
Smaller or differently-shaped maps can reduce late-game chaos.
tl;dr: Nothing that's exactly what you are looking for, but there are some options to limit or re-jumble the Strategic information. ;-)
I have it ordered, anyone here have it to offer a verdict?