Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 03, 2019, 07:01:25 pm
Taking infantry pure defender as a base value for cost comparison. Current idea is to price mixed (max weapon and armor) unit 1.5 times more than not mixed one. Speeder and foil 1.5 time more than infantry. Hovertank and cruiser 2 times more than infantry. This seems to align well for combat units.
Some questions I haven't answered for myself yet.
1. Needlejet cost factor. They probably need to be more expensive than infantry but I am not sure by how much. Due to their speed and ignoring ZOC they are menace to lightly armored units. However, they lose their value when everyone is AAA protected. Twice as much as infantry? That makes them cost same as equal strength full weapon-armor-AAA infantry and same strength full weapon-armor foil (without AAA). I think this is a good spot.
2. Copter cost factor. I guess same as needlejet as in vanilla.
3. Gravship cost factor. Vanilla prices it same as needlejet. I think it should be at least a little more expensive since it replaces all other chassis.
4. Missile cost factor. Probably about 1/2 or 2/3 of needlejet as it gets destroyed after attack.
5. Infantry/speeder and sea colony pods. Currently priced at 6/9 and 9, correspondingly. Seems to be a right price.
6. Infantry/speeder and sea formers. People say sea former should be more expensive and I agree but by how much? At the same time I don't want land former to cost hand and leg. I tried 2/3 and 3 and that seemed to be too cheap for sea one. Then I tried 4/6 and 6 and that seemed to be right for sea one but not sure about land one. Although, I don't think one time per base investment of 2 mineral rows makes a difference.
Possible options to try: 2/3 and 6, 3/4 and 6.
7. Infantry/speeder and sea supply. I don't think sea supply is at all more valuable than land one. So I've added a rule already to price them equally.
8. Infantry/speeder and sea probe. Currently at 4/6 and 6. Seems to be right price too.
Post by: bvanevery on December 04, 2019, 01:37:57 am
I could talk about how I've tuned things, but it's very much tied to when the reactors appear in my tree.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 04, 2019, 03:43:52 pm
Changing HP is very big task as it is hardcoded everywhere.
Post by: bvanevery on December 04, 2019, 04:42:18 pm
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 04, 2019, 04:54:28 pm
You are right. Weaker units are not obsolete. I occasionally build weaker units just because it is faster. Well, this is absolutely normal in strategical game. Is it not?
Post by: bvanevery on December 04, 2019, 07:50:58 pm
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 04, 2019, 08:06:08 pm
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2019, 04:18:13 am
For instance, this is a modern design in my game, upgraded from an older Fusion R-Laser design:
gratuitously obsolete |
that the game decided should be superseded the moment I designed this unit, on the very same turn:
gratuitous yet again |
which was superseded by a Speeder variant, that again I designed on the very same turn:
ephemeral blessed unit |
Notice that the first 2 units are slightly cheaper than the 3rd unit, and that the first 2 units do not have the same capabilities. I'm not 100% sure but I think the R-Laser is actually useful compared to a bigger but conventional armament. Another problem is that all though a faster chassis may be strictly better for the same cost, I've got units I need to upgrade. I can't just switch chasses. So I need these "obsolete" unit designs to do my upgrades.
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2019, 05:17:50 am
Here instead I will profess my true love for Svensgaard.
;ulrik;, :bot: ;buttdance
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2019, 06:04:59 am
But first, an animation to fill gratuitous whitespace!
;hippy ;liftoff ;nuke; ;nuke; ;nuke; :stickpoke: :dunno:
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 05, 2019, 01:01:36 pm
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2019, 07:20:37 pm
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 05, 2019, 07:41:39 pm
Sure. Exe patching is fun. I can look into it. Reverse engineering takes a lot of time to do a simplest thing, though. So it is not the question of possibility but time invested. Some changes are harder than others.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 05, 2019, 07:54:22 pm
Anyhow, I often find myself with Fusion reactor and Fusion Laser (and corresponding same strength armor) when my bases are only 4-5 size and barely started to pick up production power. Even with slowest weapon cost progression Fusion Laser would cost 8. That is 8 * 1.6 = 12 for a simple pure attacker/defender and 24 rows for a prototype. That is not exorbitant for middle size developed base but seems to be impossible for my teeny-tiny-just-out-of-stone-age villages. So I need to do something with the reactor cost or with research pace or both.
I have set research rate to 50%. Even this doesn't help. Discoveries poor at me like a rain. I guess this is the consequence of Thinker mod making AI faction smarter in terraforming and thus developing faster which speeds up common research pace too.
Although, upon thinking, it does seem about normal to uncover 25-30% of research by turn 100 assuming overall game takes 300-400 turns or even less. Maybe it is just me not able to develop my bases quick enough?
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2019, 11:21:58 pm
You mean obsolete cheaper inferior unit? I think it already does it.
No no no, the opposite! The criteria for obsoletion should consider whether a unit is cheap and useful. If it is, it shouldn't just cancel the design.
2.0 to 1.6 it is still a huge jump for undeveloped civilization.
In my mod, first I had to stabilize the appearance of the reactors in my tree. That took some time because many direct and indirect factors could cause me to move a tech around in the tree. Then I had to make sure that the paths to reaching the techs were equitable. I've had very easy paths to get to Fusion power, very obstructive paths, and I think now I have something sort of in between. How you weight the tech changes very much how quickly or slowly it is discovered.
After my regime of Fusion Power and Quantum Power were settled, it took several iterations of manually tweaking unit costs, before I found a balance of chassis, weapon, and armor costs that seemed reasonable to me. I may have nailed it now, but my provisional results are still subject to other people's playtesting and complaining. People could still tell me that they think things are unfair. But I think I've at least stepped away from the ridiculous. I've had enough iterations to figure that out. For awhile I had some grossly expensive late game units, and I toned that down recently. The real trouble with deciding such things, is you have to actually get to a late game to experience those costs firsthand, to have an idea how much they really impact. It's always more difficult to get to a complete late game, they take a bloody long time to play.
All of these costs are tied together in a web. It's not generally possible to figure out a simple formula for what the costs should be, because the web is sufficiently complex.
I guess this is the consequence of Thinker mod making AI faction smarter in terraforming and thus developing faster which speeds up common research pace too.
I don't believe in establishing any game rules or phenomena with Thinker Mod egging anything on. To me, the purpose of Thinker Mod is to find the exploits that it likes, and then plug them as best I can. This also somewhat simulates a human player who likes to use exploits. Often I can only delay the exploit, I cannot end it entirely. Huge delays are an important tool though, i.e. no Thermal Boreholes until the late midgame in my mod.
You of course aren't required to use Thinker Mod's default settings to create an experience though! You can tone it down or change it around however you want.
Although, upon thinking, it does seem about normal to uncover 25-30% of research by turn 100 assuming
I seriously doubt that in my mod. At turn 100 I believe most factions will be learning some of the Tier 3 techs. Most of these are obstructed by Secret Projects. They will not trade with each other, or with you, until the Secret Projects are completed. This design is completely deliberate on my part. It's to slow down the tech trading hyper economy. For the same reason, I don't give factions any starter techs, except where absolutely required. I don't think my Tier 3 represents 25% of the techs in the tree, but I haven't counted them up to be sure.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 12:28:11 am
You mean obsolete cheaper inferior unit? I think it already does it.
No no no, the opposite! The criteria for obsoletion should consider whether a unit is cheap and useful. If it is, it shouldn't just cancel the design.
The game does it opposite or you want it opposite? And what is useful?
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 12:32:53 am
2.0 to 1.6 it is still a huge jump for undeveloped civilization.
In my mod, first I had to stabilize the appearance of the reactors in my tree. That took some time because many direct and indirect factors could cause me to move a tech around in the tree. Then I had to make sure that the paths to reaching the techs were equitable. I've had very easy paths to get to Fusion power, very obstructive paths, and I think now I have something sort of in between. How you weight the tech changes very much how quickly or slowly it is discovered.
After my regime of Fusion Power and Quantum Power were settled, it took several iterations of manually tweaking unit costs, before I found a balance of chassis, weapon, and armor costs that seemed reasonable to me. I may have nailed it now, but my provisional results are still subject to other people's playtesting and complaining. People could still tell me that they think things are unfair. But I think I've at least stepped away from the ridiculous. I've had enough iterations to figure that out. For awhile I had some grossly expensive late game units, and I toned that down recently. The real trouble with deciding such things, is you have to actually get to a late game to experience those costs firsthand, to have an idea how much they really impact. It's always more difficult to get to a complete late game, they take a bloody long time to play.
All of these costs are tied together in a web. It's not generally possible to figure out a simple formula for what the costs should be, because the web is sufficiently complex.
I agree you did a great job on this. I don't want to go this path, though. The time when you get a technology varies. And it should. This is the game primary concept. So if I want to set something in the tech tree I use only very rough positioning, like 25% for Fusion reactor which could be easily anywhere between 15% and 35% and who know at which exact year it happens - this can fluctuate even stronger. Trying to time everything perfectly is flawed in my eyes. Instead I try to price them right. So even if you get it early you still pay the right price.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 12:35:37 am
I guess this is the consequence of Thinker mod making AI faction smarter in terraforming and thus developing faster which speeds up common research pace too.
I don't believe in establishing any game rules or phenomena with Thinker Mod egging anything on. To me, the purpose of Thinker Mod is to find the exploits that it likes, and then plug them as best I can. This also somewhat simulates a human player who likes to use exploits. Often I can only delay the exploit, I cannot end it entirely. Huge delays are an important tool though, i.e. no Thermal Boreholes until the late midgame in my mod.
You of course aren't required to use Thinker Mod's default settings to create an experience though! You can tone it down or change it around however you want.
It doesn't sound like Thinker mod a I know it. You should read its description and/or play it. It targets on improving AI and it does it very well. AI developers very fast there.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 01:10:11 am
There are two option to go by.
1. Reactor doesn't change the price but changes effective HP by some percentage, like 20%. Higher HP gives some battle advantage. However, fractional burning HP will be hard to implement. Unit with singularity reactor will have twice more HPs.
2. Reactor doesn't change the effective HP. I.e. higher reactor burns HP proportionally faster. This way higher reactor doesn't give battle advantage but it makes units cheaper thus more economically effective. Unit with singularity reactor will be twice cheaper.
I think I'll end up with #2 anyway as it seems to be easier to implement. I'll just multiply damage by reactor level. Same way as native combat does.
Post by: bvanevery on December 06, 2019, 05:18:26 am
It doesn't sound like Thinker mod a I know it. You should read its description and/or play it.
Dude, go read the writeups of the 14 games I played of it earlier this year. Here's the last one (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=21232.0) I tested. I haven't played it lately and I don't intend to.
Post by: bvanevery on December 06, 2019, 05:25:11 am
And what is useful?
"Useful" unfortunately has to be decided on a per type basis. For instance, a Fission Probe Team is still useful for stealing techs from bases. And for sabotaging, and for inflicting plagues. There's a benefit / cost analysis for putting bigger reactors on such units. In my mod, for instance, drop units are pretty useful once you've got Graviton Theory or the Space Elevator built and can do orbital insertions. Drop capability is somewhat expensive, so I have found that Fission Drop probe teams are often more cost effective than Fusion Drop versions.
A lot also depends on the prevailing minerals output of your cities, as to what is "useful". Units that take a long time to deploy aren't all that useful.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 02:21:23 pm
It doesn't sound like Thinker mod a I know it. You should read its description and/or play it.
Dude, go read the writeups of the 14 games I played of it earlier this year. Here's the last one (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=21232.0) I tested. I haven't played it lately and I don't intend to.
Maybe wrong wording. I meant in my understanding Thinker tries to improve AI play. Doesn't target to eliminate exploit for human. But never mind. This has nothing to do with the main discussion.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 02:23:19 pm
Drop capability is somewhat expensive, so I have found that Fission Drop probe teams are often more cost effective than Fusion Drop versions.
If you are playing unpatched version how come your Fusion unit is more expensive?
Post by: bvanevery on December 06, 2019, 04:38:51 pm
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 06, 2019, 06:07:03 pm
Post by: bvanevery on December 07, 2019, 12:28:28 am
Post by: dino on December 07, 2019, 10:28:28 am
2. Reactor doesn't change the effective HP. I.e. higher reactor burns HP proportionally faster. This way higher reactor doesn't give battle advantage but it makes units cheaper thus more economically effective. Unit with singularity reactor will be twice cheaper.
I was always thinking that would be the best solution, but didn't want to bother Inductio about it, since gameplay changes are not his thing. It gives quiet interesting effect, when max army size one can support doesn't change, but in case of total war across land border cheaper production allows to replace looses faster. That way reactor is both less overpowered and provides a different benefit than weapon and armor.
While you are at it, you could make both reactor impact on cost and reactor HP burn rate as you called it, adjustable through ini, since it will be hard to find a consensus among players on what values should be. I'm not even sure on values I'd set for myself until I try it ingame, but I lean toward completely neutering combat advantage and changing cost reduction rates to 100/75/50/25, from 100/50/25/12,5 %
There is one more issue to consider though, you should also adjust calculation of combat outcome estimation, to not confuse both AIs and players decission making.
Post by: bvanevery on December 07, 2019, 02:37:20 pm
While you are at it, you could make both reactor impact on cost and reactor HP burn rate as you called it, adjustable through ini, since it will be hard to find a consensus among players on what values should be.
Think carefully about providing "ease of fundamental change" features like this. Is your goal to write a modder's toolkit? Or is your goal to popularize your mod?
If the latter, you need to make decisions, and then promote your game design. For my mod I don't run around apologizing or second guessing the changes I made. I do take input from other people and I do listen to what playtesters have to say. Tweaking your scheme yourself is very different from promoting a never-ending expansion of different forks to be tweaked. And I really don't believe in handing players the tools to turn important core features on and off, because that means (say) 50% of people who could have been playtesting your mod, now aren't. They're off on that other options path. Option-itis is a curse for any kind of testing: game, 3d graphics benchmark, doesn't matter, it creates work.
The considerate thing to do would be to document how you did your changes somewhere, so that other binary modders who want to grab your GPL licensed work and commit to doing something different with it, can do so. My version of that sort of thing is my CHANGELOG. Almost every gory detail of what I've done is in there. Only my 1st month of initial development is missing, before I made a release.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 07, 2019, 04:36:55 pm
Hey while you're at it, look at upgrade costs. I just learned from the Reddit sub /r/alphacentauri that there's a pretty serious exploit where you can upgrade a supply crawler for very cheap. Way cheaper than you can then cash it in for Secret Project minerals.
Upgrade cost formula.
http://alphacentauri2.info/wiki/Upgrade_Cost
You cannot upgrade between different chassis.
Well, I am sure there are tons of exploit just because you cannot tie all the ends properly. Don't understand what is "upgrade a supply crawler", though. It is still a Supply module of the same price. Do you put extra armor on upgraded unit?
I didn't play test it but here is the math from the above formula.
Supply crawler [unit cost 3] -> Supply crawler with armor cost 10 [unit cost 13].
WeaponRise = 0,
ArmorRise = 10 - 1 = 9
NewRowsCost = 13
total upgrade cost = 0 + 9+ 13 = 22
total bonus project cost = [13 - 3] * 4 = 40
Yep. That is an exploit all right. Essentially it makes your project about twice as cheap to spend money on. However, it is still extremely expensive to pay completely for. Big part of it is usually minerals.
I guess this is due to the fact of stupid vanilla unit cost formula which makes mixed units cost to grow quadratic of armor price. I guess effect increases with more expensive armor.
Just out of curiosity, let me see how it works out in my unit cost calculation model.
Supply crawler [unit cost 8] -> Supply crawler with armor cost 10 [unit cost 13].
WeaponRise = 0,
ArmorRise = 10 - 1 = 9
NewRowsCost = 13
total upgrade cost = 0 + 9+ 13 = 22
total bonus project cost = [13 - 8] * 4 = 20
Woo-hoo! Apparently I fixed this exploit even not knowing about its existence.
:D
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 07, 2019, 05:16:42 pm
2. Reactor doesn't change the effective HP. I.e. higher reactor burns HP proportionally faster. This way higher reactor doesn't give battle advantage but it makes units cheaper thus more economically effective. Unit with singularity reactor will be twice cheaper.
I was always thinking that would be the best solution, but didn't want to bother Inductio about it, since gameplay changes are not his thing. It gives quiet interesting effect, when max army size one can support doesn't change, but in case of total war across land border cheaper production allows to replace looses faster. That way reactor is both less overpowered and provides a different benefit than weapon and armor.
Exactly, man! Why didn't you share your idea with me earlier since gameplay changes are my thing now?
:)
I've implemented it and I love it love it!
- It does solve overpowered reactor HP problem. It just vanished now!
- Unit cost does not double/triple with reactor as in my previous solution. They stay on quite reasonable level throughout the game both because relatively slower weapon/armor cost progression and reactor discount. Pure attacker infantry with strongest weapon and Singularity engine is only 10 rows. Of course, hovertanks and ships will be somewhat more but this is bearable for end game.
- I extended reactor discount equally to non combat units as well. I believe this makes sense. They do not change equipment to more costly but cost reduction allow to use more expensive chassis, armor, and abilities on them without ridiculous cost growing. Fission infantry colony pod = 6 -> Singularity hovertank colony pod = 6 too. Fission infantry former = 4 -> Singularity speeder clean super former = 4 too.
- As you exactly pointed out, while stronger weapon/armor provides combat survivability (and later healing) advantage, reactor now delivers economical efficiency for units. I like such diversity too.
New reactor dropping price 20% is not some extraordinary economical advantage but it is right on the money for new technology value. Doesn't make it too overpowered but does still keep it useful to target.
By the way, reactor price proportion is right there in alphax.txt replacing reactor power value. One can easily tweak it. However, I don't think dropping price more than half for latest reactor is any good. You are constrained with minimal unit cost of 6 for Singularity engine anyway.
While you are at it, you could make both reactor impact on cost and reactor HP burn rate as you called it, adjustable through ini, since it will be hard to find a consensus among players on what values should be.
I didn't find a good way to do flexible rate. Currently I just reuse the psi combat mechanics that sets each unit firepower to the opponent reactor value. HP burn rate is essentially same as temporarily setting opponents firepower to the unit reactor value for the course of the battle. I just call it that to highlight that this rate pertains to the unit with corresponding reactor not to the opponent whose FP is temporarily adjusted to provide unit desired HP burn rate.
Current firepower is a whole number of damage unit inflicts to the opponent if it wins the combat round. Flexible HP burn rate requires fractional FP that is impossible to implement. The best thing you can play with is to set reactor HP burn rate to higher whole numbers. Like Fission = 2, Fusion = 3, which makes their effective HPs 10/2 = 5 and 20/3 = 7, correspondingly.
That is theoretically possible. Unfortunately, there is only one unused field in alphax.txt and I already use it for cost factor. Flexible burn rate will be quite difficult to implement properly. Plus all the odds computation, plus all the help entries. Is it worth it?
I'm not even sure on values I'd set for myself until I try it ingame, but I lean toward completely neutering combat advantage and changing cost reduction rates to 100/75/50/25, from 100/50/25/12,5 %
My current digression is 100/80/65/50. I don't see a point in reducing it even more, as I mentioned above. Otherwise, all non combat units will hit minimal unit cost. Of course, we can exclude non combat modules from reactor effect or make it different. I tried it in my previous version and I didn't like it. It adds unnecessary complexity to the game mechanics that is difficult for player to grasp.
There is one more issue to consider though, you should also adjust calculation of combat outcome estimation, to not confuse both AIs and players decission making.
Right. That is on my TODO list. Currently odds are calculated incorrectly.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 07, 2019, 05:36:41 pm
While you are at it, you could make both reactor impact on cost and reactor HP burn rate as you called it, adjustable through ini, since it will be hard to find a consensus among players on what values should be.
Think carefully about providing "ease of fundamental change" features like this. Is your goal to write a modder's toolkit? Or is your goal to popularize your mod?
If the latter, you need to make decisions, and then promote your game design. For my mod I don't run around apologizing or second guessing the changes I made. I do take input from other people and I do listen to what playtesters have to say. Tweaking your scheme yourself is very different from promoting a never-ending expansion of different forks to be tweaked. And I really don't believe in handing players the tools to turn important core features on and off, because that means (say) 50% of people who could have been playtesting your mod, now aren't. They're off on that other options path. Option-itis is a curse for any kind of testing: game, 3d graphics benchmark, doesn't matter, it creates work.
The considerate thing to do would be to document how you did your changes somewhere, so that other binary modders who want to grab your GPL licensed work and commit to doing something different with it, can do so. My version of that sort of thing is my CHANGELOG. Almost every gory detail of what I've done is in there. Only my 1st month of initial development is missing, before I made a release.
Wise words, man. Thank you for pointing this out.
It was always a latter. I am building a game, not a toolkit.
To dino and others.
Read through my mod statement in README. I do not create new experience as many other modders. My goal is to clean up clutter, breaks, exploits, stupid implementation as much as possible to let original game features shine strategically as they were intended to. I do not bother with "balancing" of anything. Merely fixing problems.
Reactor HP multiplier was a real game breaker. So I fixed it easiest possible way. Done. Unfortunately, this fix also rendered reactors useless. So I had to give them some benefit in unit cost domain so the player have incentive to research and use them. I also toned down this benefit so it is not overpowered and doesn't break game too.
The rest of it - whether make it 15% or 20% or 25% cost drop is a sandbox play which I am not interested in. It does not affect game play significantly. There are a lot of other things requiring my attention.
I would definitely appreciate players feedback on what this price drop should be and collectively we can find a sweet spot for it and keep it this way and then enjoy the game together instead of everybody wasting their time on tweaking unimportant game parameter.
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 07, 2019, 07:53:59 pm
:(
One tiny inconvenience I just discovered is that it is useless to pay for reactor upgrade. It does not add to the already built unit value. I guess this is a minor thing to worry about. After all, further upgrades to unit with both better weapon/armor and better reactor do make sense as better reactor lowers target unit cost thus lowering upgrade cost.
However, it seems that upgrade cost and rush cost formulas can be simplified to avoid related exploits completely.
Here is the proposition:
- Set all rush cost to be flat - no special 10 mineral restrictions or anything.
- Set unit rush cost to purchased minerals x 4.
- Set unit upgrade cost to cost difference. It is that simple! Now you can actually upgrade reactor and shave some money off it as you get cheaper units. Not sure if it is implementable, though. Just an idea.
Rationale
It is better to avoid any complex formulas unless it breaks the game. Speaking about quadratic growing unit rushing cost formula, I don't see what strategical variety it brings. Yes, it is now more cost effective to invest in facilities than not in units. Pricing unit rushing cost flat with x4 multiplier achieves same effect. There is a subtle numeric variation between flat cost and growing cost but most of the time you'll be investing in facilities anyway so these variations do not apply and do not do any significant impact to the game. On the other side, simplifying formulas gives player clarity in their actions. They now know exactly how much it'll cost without tapping calculator.
Same story with 10 minerals restriction. I don't see anything in it it except cluttering player's mind and hindering the progress for everybody. What's the problem in building facilities quickly in new bases if you have money for it?
Simplifying unit rush cost also naturally calls for similar simplicity in unit upgrade cost. Just pay the rush cost difference. Linear cost eliminates any exploits in the way upgrades are applied. One will end up paying same price for upgrading A -> B or A -> C -> B. Setting unit rush cost multiplier same as for SP eliminates crawler rush exploit as well.
Killing 5+ birds with a couple of stones.
Post by: bvanevery on December 07, 2019, 11:18:38 pm
Yep. That is an exploit all right. Essentially it makes your project about twice as cheap to spend money on.
That's the essence of the Supply Crawler Upgrade exploit. Half price.
Quote
However, it is still extremely expensive to pay completely for. Big part of it is usually minerals.
I have found that Secret Projects cost a flat 40 minerals to avoid the big rush penalty. Even projects in my mod that cost 1000 minerals. I was led to believe that one had to complete 20% of a project in order to avoid the penalty. 40 minerals is indeed 20% of 200 minerals, the cost of the cheapest projects in the original game. However what I see is that it costs 40 minerals, period, The End, doesn't matter what the project costs.
Quote
Woo-hoo! Apparently I fixed this exploit even not knowing about its existence.
:D
I'm feeling a little formula challenged right now. I'll study it later. Supply Crawlers in my mod are quite expensive. A Fusion Supply Crawler, infantry chassis, no armor, no abilities, costs 50 minerals. Deliberately just like an Artifact. A Fission is like 80 minerals, to get the Fusion to be 50. I could do an upgrade experiment to see if I've resolved anything...
Post by: Alpha Centauri Bear on December 08, 2019, 12:22:48 am
I have found that Secret Projects cost a flat 40 minerals to avoid the big rush penalty. Even projects in my mod that cost 1000 minerals. I was led to believe that one had to complete 20% of a project in order to avoid the penalty. 40 minerals is indeed 20% of 200 minerals, the cost of the cheapest projects in the original game. However what I see is that it costs 40 minerals, period, The End, doesn't matter what the project costs.
You need to fill out first 4 rows for SP to by the rest by x4. Otherwise, it is more expensive. See hurry formula.
Post by: bvanevery on December 08, 2019, 01:00:52 am