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sometimes the patch for that game needs to be updated..

Why, yes. Yes I am.

On a completely unrelated note, apparently someone's selling some kind of game.

 

Chris you very very sexy man

I was just demoing the game for a friend, and decided to check in on the forums.  I haven't been playing much, but send me a message on steam if your ever up for a match.  The new map looks cool minus!   I've been busy working on a fighting game and online file storage system, so I haven't been playing much on steam recently.

Just played a Quick Start game on Highest difficulty, and as soon as the AI had 3 planets they started doing upgrades every turn. I guess it's an intermittent problem. If you see it again, I'd appreciate seeing as many details as you can provide, including screenshots etc., to help me track it down. Thanks!

1. My very first game was set-up on a "huge" map, against 7 comps, with ship movement defined as "fast". I was located in the NNW position, at a 1-turn distance of a comp located at the North position and at a 2-turn distance of the comp located (below me) at the West position. I'm 100% certain of that, but I don't have a screenshot to illustrate it.

Oops! Must be a rounding bug. Thanks for the report, I'll make a note.

2. Concerning the "stupid" A.I., I find it strange that on the "average" level, my 7 enemies did not build one single factory. In my 2nd game, at the "higher" level, the 7 of them built factories, but some did not build enough. Strangely, in my 3rd game, at the "highest" level, the 7 comps did not build one single factory! I'm not a programmer, but I wonder if it would be so difficult to force the A.I., at the average, high & highest levels to always build factories. If you don't build factories and the surrounding natives keep on growing, it's difficult to overwhelm them with few losses.

Hmmm. They are supposed to build factories on "highest" exactly the same as they do on "higher". I'll take a look.

The AI does not cheat, and cannot see into the fog of war.

1. I had noticed that, because when I played against 7 comps at the highest level of A.I., and with the fog of war totally removed, I could see that my 7 adversaries started with the same number of ships and did not grow at an abnormal, excessive pace. I like that.

2. Consequently, my future games will have the fog of war totally on for myself. If it is turned off, it does grant me a very unfair advantage : I can see the ship strength of every planet on the map, and since I can perceive incoming attack trajectories, I can too easily prepare myself.

On Wednesday, I played 3 games (random/huge, max. planets, 7 enemies), on average, high & highest, and I won too easily : certainly, in a major part, because of my very unfair no-fog-of-war advantage. I'm certain that I will always win again, because I stockpile ships until I have a big enough armada to overwhelm my neighbours, and a big enough factory-upgrade level to generate a sufficient defensive force per turn (to secure my planet when my offensive armada has left). Since the A.I. don't seem to build enough factories, it won't be able to compete, in the long run. Not having the fog of war turned on will only make me more cautious & patient, but it won't change my factory building and ship stockpiling Strategy.

I prefer to play on vast maps, but I guess that the smaller the map, with the most enemies, the more the probability that very stressful, early threats can increase. I will eventually try that.  

What size map was this? The AI won't upgrade any factories unless it owns at least 3 planets.

A random "huge" map, with 333 planets in the game set-up (but the actual number generated was much lower than that).

The random map generator always places planets in a ring, so that the distance between adjacent starting locations is exactly equal (unless there are rounding errors, but I've never seen that happen). The size of the ring does depend on the map size. You shouldn't be seeing players start so close together. Did you change the ship speed? How many AI players were in the game?

The AI, as you've noticed, is quite stupid; it doesn't do much in the way of strategy. I would like to improve it one day.

1. My very first game was set-up on a "huge" map, against 7 comps, with ship movement defined as "fast". I was located in the NNW position, at a 1-turn distance of a comp located at the North position and at a 2-turn distance of the comp located (below me) at the West position. I'm 100% certain of that, but I don't have a screenshot to illustrate it.

2. Concerning the "stupid" A.I., I find it strange that on the "average" level, my 7 enemies did not build one single factory. In my 2nd game, at the "higher" level, the 7 of them built factories, but some did not build enough. Strangely, in my 3rd game, at the "highest" level, the 7 comps did not build one single factory! I'm not a programmer, but I wonder if it would be so difficult to force the A.I., at the average, high & highest levels to always build factories. If you don't build factories and the surrounding natives keep on growing, it's difficult to overwhelm them with few losses.

Welcome! I like your sense of priorities.