It is time for an advanced build order que

[coodav]

See I look at both of these maps and think "Why was this game still going?" Going wide is such a massive economic advantage that you should have the production to just auto-battle your way to the win. I see that you pulled out the Doomsday win on one of them. And I'll admit that still takes time when you set up a map this big, but you kinda asked for that one when you chose the map size.

Because I am playing TEAMS against 9 enemy AIs on the highest setting. If I didn't set victory to domination with max settings, the computer would win by turn 30, no matter what I did. They EXPLODE across the map, and their cities go crazy. Only by setting victory conditions to the absolute highest level was I able to play at all.

And this is the only challenge left because with the right unit and mod combinations, you just obliterate your opponents, often losing nothing. I HAVE to play against 9 AIs to make it hard. I don't honestly know why you would slum it on lower settings for any reason. That game would just be a cakewalk. I actually enjoy the ability to lose for real.

That doesn't sound like a lot of work. AI governors and build planners sound like a lot of work. I made that pretty clear.

Also like... can you just give me an example of a time you have wanted to queue 11 items. I just wanna know what you were building.

So easy example from that game. Conquered the first AI city. It is certainly max size, because the computer cheats so bad. Accordingly, I need a level 3 defense, plus turrets and maybe hospital, none of which ever exist. Plus all of the exploitations are wrong. For instance, they have a food exploitation on a +0 food, +2 factory space. Madness. I need to get the production up and get those defenses built ASAP. So it takes literally 12 visits to the city to make that happen, minimum. That is at least 13 trips overall: 1 trip to que up the 5 defenses. Then 12 unique visits to the city to figure out the exploitations. That is 1 for the deconstruction, which CANNOT BE QUED with the next exploitation, it can only be done manually. Then I have to pick the expoitation, which CANNOT BE QUED to the specialization, it must be done manually. That is 13 trips minimum from the go, losing 3 trips per exploitation that isn't busted, which is usually never, and heaven forbid a sector is conquered while you are doing this, cuz you will be visiting that town for the rest of the game. THAT IS STUPID. This system is horrifically broken, and if you say it isn't then you don't play where things matter much. Try a few like this, and be ready to play.

I've played games that went to turn 90 before. City management still didn't take that much time (tho tbf I rarely bothered integrating conquered cities).

I agree that we're playing different games. I would say that you've taken this one, pushed it to the absolute possible limits, intentionally failed to end the game when you could have, and then asked the devs to build features to make your artificial pushing of the boundaries easier. This seems a bit unreasonable to me.

Again, since that top map image was playing teams 1 v 9 against Insane AIs, they would have doomsday before I have my fifth technology. The only way that I can possibly play is to disallow those as victory conditions. It is simply impossible for your units to move that far in that amount of time before the timer ran out. You would always lose, period. Bottom line is that if you min/max as much as I like to, this is where the game always goes. I bet there are a lot of people like me out there, though I can't be sure. That said, if you play the game at this level, this always happens. So again, I disagree.

Can I get a 'second' on this one? A few 'a-men, brothers?' Some of you guys have to play like this. Some of you have to like doing more than just pounding the computer into dust? There have to be a thousand people who think this build system is idiotic. Sound off for me if you can.

 

[coodav]

AoW 3 had a queue that had bigger icon you could drag and drop and when you added anything to the queue you could add stuff that required it to the queue after it. It also had a "repeat queue infinitely" button.

What we have now is is an absolute step back and I can see no reason why, except for the UI design to make it work with a controller maybe. At least we probably have it to thank for the unergonomic design of the happiness notifocations.

And this. For sure.

 

[coodav]

coodav

You are not the only one who plays the largest maps. I play with domination victory only and I believe your game is too easy if you find time to queue 5+ items.
I recommend you to increase difficulty level via mods. For instance,
Truly Extreme World Threat (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2133247866)
More Stronger AI (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2131544833)
AI Adjustments (Less Dwelling Spam) (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2131968560).
Second one is not compatible with third one so choose just just one of those.
In my game I don't have time to even build exploitation (no water, largest map), 12 teams because I regularly lose sectors to marauders and AIs attack me from all sides.

I will have to think about this. I typically don't like mods, as you can't play other players except under specific circumstances. And in the end, it would be swell if the AI was simply smarter, and the game had a que, but this might work.

 

[MrNo]

I'm not sure I've ever seen an AI launch a doomsday victory. I usually only play 1v3-6 extreme though and the game never exceeds turn 50 so what do I know. I can understand turning off domination; I usually play doomsday/unifier enabled without any trouble though, and the game always ends with Last Man Standing.

I had actually forgotten the repeating research queue thing from AoW 3. That should probably make a comeback.

Dealing with exploitations is 3 visits max, not 12; you can queue deconstructon of exploitations, construction of exploitations, and construction of specializations in 3 waves. You're technically missing a very 3/2/1 turns of resource production on the sectors by not going deconstruct -> reconstruct for each of them in succession. Also that idea of razing them that sandman has is really good and I'll totally remember to use it next time I care enough to swap exploitations.

I don't know what you mean "min/max as much as I do". Unless you mean that you like to get every sector maxed out to the highest potential before finishing a game, that should actually *speed up* the game since the AI is absolutely incapable of doing the same.

I think I've basically said what I want. Good luck getting this through. I'd specifically prefer queuing of exploitations -> specializations, repeating production queue, and maybe a longer production queue (barring UI concerns) as the priorities.

 

[HousePet]

The thing is, why stop there? Why not go ahead and just do it right? Give the expansion plan, and put a marker on the map for sectors that are taken.

Because as soon as you set down the plans, a World Event will blow through an mess them up.

... you know it never occurred to me to do that? That's a pretty funny way to work around the time limit lol.

Ditto.
Still wish they would make deconstruction instant, or allow the repurposing of Sectors without requiring a turn of dismantling.

 

[coodav]

I'm not sure I've ever seen an AI launch a doomsday victory. I usually only play 1v3-6 extreme though and the game never exceeds turn 50 so what do I know. I can understand turning off domination; I usually play doomsday/unifier enabled without any trouble though, and the game always ends with Last Man Standing.

I had actually forgotten the repeating research queue thing from AoW 3. That should probably make a comeback.

Dealing with exploitations is 3 visits max, not 12; you can queue deconstructon of exploitations, construction of exploitations, and construction of specializations in 3 waves. You're technically missing a very 3/2/1 turns of resource production on the sectors by not going deconstruct -> reconstruct for each of them in succession. Also that idea of razing them that sandman has is really good and I'll totally remember to use it next time I care enough to swap exploitations.

I don't know what you mean "min/max as much as I do". Unless you mean that you like to get every sector maxed out to the highest potential before finishing a game, that should actually *speed up* the game since the AI is absolutely incapable of doing the same.

I think I've basically said what I want. Good luck getting this through. I'd specifically prefer queuing of exploitations -> specializations, repeating production queue, and maybe a longer production queue (barring UI concerns) as the priorities.

Let me discuss those exploitations, and why it always happens like this. Yes, it is true that you can que all of the exploitations to be taken down at once, but then it would leave your city with no exploitations while the computer is bearing down on you. So if you have a civil engineering building up, you really need to leave it up until you are finished. If you que all of the buildings to implode at once, you are hamstringing yourself badly when you need production most. I tend to like cutting them one at a time AFTER I get the defenses up. That is way more efficient.

What you are talking about can be done if you are willing to finish reconstruction of the city in maybe 5 or so additional turns. That might be the better way typically, but it is actually more game turns, even if fewer hours of gameplay, and gets dicey if the computer is really on top of you.

As for the min/max thing, there are a few god-mode combinations of each race and NPC combinations. If you play under these conditions, you really have to use them as a foundation. All I am saying is that you have to do everything, all in the same game, to make this type of game work. It is a bit frustrating with the current mechanics, as the system is really unwieldy right now. It would be nice if this was resolved, and I could play more games without fighting the system so much.

 

[Sandman25DCSSS]

You still can play MP with mods, every player just should use the same mods.

 

[Lazures]

Honestly disagreeing with this stuff makes no sense. If what Coodav proposed becomes a thing, it will be an option you can simply opt-out.

I play against 6-8 AI's on Large maps and sometimes Enormous with 10-12 and holy hell managing cities is really a chore. The AI picking bad sectors and colonies is a cherry on top because it doesn't make sense to not utilize the cities you captured. So you have to go through deconstruction, repurposing anyway.

The queue is still a band-aid for the actual problem though. The AI in strategy games in general makes so many ridiculous decisions that it baffles me.

 

[coodav]

Honestly disagreeing with this stuff makes no sense. If what Coodav proposed becomes a thing, it will be an option you can simply opt-out.

I play against 6-8 AI's on Large maps and sometimes Enormous with 10-12 and holy hell managing cities is really a chore. The AI picking bad sectors and colonies is a cherry on top because it doesn't make sense to not utilize the cities you captured. So you have to go through deconstruction, repurposing anyway.

The queue is still a band-aid for the actual problem though. The AI in strategy games in general makes so many ridiculous decisions that it baffles me.

A-MEN brother. Yes, thank you.

And you are so right. I was kind-of thinking that with the advances in AI, that we might finally see some changes to this. Wouldn't it be nice to play an AI and think, "wow, great game, that was close. If he hadn't made that one mistake in turn 50, things would have been different." But we are so incredibly far from that it is perplexing. We are still facing a mountain of cheating to get to par.

 

[coodav]

And how do you do 10-12? Your computer must be bonkers, cuz mine starts to eat itself somewhere around 8 AI. You must end it super-fast. Do you invade mid-game?

 

[MrNo]

Honestly disagreeing with this stuff makes no sense. If what Coodav proposed becomes a thing, it will be an option you can simply opt-out.

If somebody makes a suggestion, and the devs see unanimous agreement, they're going to be more likely to implement it.

I think this would take ages to implement and serve a very small portion of the community. I'd rather devs not put time into stuff like that.

Therefore, I object to the claims of its usefulness.

A bit self serving? Yup. Practical? Yup. I've also pointed to the segments that I think would be easier to do and serve more of the community.

 

[Sandman25DCSSS]

I play simultaneous turns to increase performance, it really helps. Just wait until all AIs are done before moving your units.

 

[coodav]

I'll have to try that. Anything to stop the infinite drag on the system.

 

[BloodyBattleBrain]

What we have now is is an absolute step back and I can see no reason why,

It's because in AoW3 you could queue up as much stuff as you liked and the game would not take payment for it until the turn came. So if you queued up something to start in 6 turns, payment would happen in 6 turns, and if there was no money it would just halt, and if you had multiple items like this, the game would randomly start production on one.

Plus any production leftover was wasted.

In PF, payment is taken as soon as you queue an item up, so if I queue up 3 Indentured and then a colonist, all those resources get taken away (btw, that is a handy way to sink resources if you are getting robbed by the Ai's energy stealing covert operation. If those resources aren't in the global pool they can't be stolen) immediately, therefore being able to queue up a hundred things (that require resources) literally can't happen.

If what you are queuing up has no energy or cosmite cost, then it can already happen.

And you can set your cities to constantly just produce energy, and never manage them again. Certainly, by the mid to late game, I have 2 or 3 production cities and the rest are just energy/food/research farms, and my games are over long before I get to 43 cities (same in AoW3 fwiw.)

I think the Op's real problem is the end game slog, which is better in PF than in AoW3, and to be honest there aren't many solutions to this, and expanding a build queue isn't one of them.

I can see the argument for being able to preselect a sector to be absorbed so as to have fewer clicks, for when you absolutely know that is where you want to expand.