Sins of a Solar Empire Releases Today

[Jade Falcon]

Are there random maps, or are they all premade?

There's three star system sizes to choose from s,m,l and each has a random map generator, then each has scenario type maps that I think are random but haven't tried them yet.

[Kitsune]

I picked it up and played a little (i.e. until dawn, I'm fucking awful with putting down strategy games).  I have yet to win, but have steamrolled my opponent into a single system and have four level 10 capital ships blowing the fuck out of anything he scrounges up to send my way, so the game was basically mine by the time I was too bleary to keep playing.  My initial impression... was a bit off.  The tutorials cover so little of the actual gameplay that I was utterly lost for the first half-hour or so, flailing around in ignorance and generally not accomplishing much.  There's such a big gap between what the tutorials tell you (how to move a ship) and what you actually need to know (what the ships do) that you may as well consider your first couple of plays to be the actual tutorial.  Now that I actually have a handle on things, I think I can take another shot at it and have a more enjoyable time.

I don't think the game has what it takes to be a good multiplayer empire builder, sadly.  It has (unless I've missed them) only relatively basic tools for working with another player, hinging around resource-sharing rather than more complicated deals like technology and military trades.  Whenever I've been in multiplayer empire building games (Stars!) with friends, we've focused heavily on alliances, working together, the occasional betrayal, never an every man for himself kind of thing.

[Moaner]

Holy shit, someone else played Stars!  Me and a college roomate played it almost religiously for years.  It was great fun and way ahead of its time.

With that said, I have yet to play a multiplayer game of Sins.  From what I've seen in single player though I'd imagine you could trade resources and establish alliances.  I do wish there were more diplomatic options, perhaps they will add some in the coming patches.

I finally beat my first medium map against 3 medium AI opponents last night.  The game took 17 hours total with the first 10 being mostly gathering planets and holding them until the right time presented itself to bring holy death down upon the surrounding empires.  It was glorious.  It was by no means and easy win for me either as there were a couple battles which could have easily went both ways had it not been for me loading a previous save and preparing better.

Also, the more I play the more I like Sins.  I wasn’t sure at first, it seemed too complicated and the real time aspect of it made me feel rushed, something I don’t appreciate in a 4x game.  Once it clicks though it becomes obvious just how simplistic the game really is.  Now I wish there were more options.  The game needs custom ships similar to GalCiv or Ascendancy.  Also, more civil buildings and ships would help.  I’d like a capital style ship that specializes in boosting civil defense systems, speeding resource gathering, or amplifying cultural broadcasting.

As it stands I haven’t had this much fun on my PC in years.  With a few patches or maybe an expansion, this game could go down with the likes of XCom and Masters of Magic in my book.  It’s fucking genius.

Edit:  Also, after playing Sins I realized how much I missed games set in space.  I have had a huge passion for cosmology since I can remember.  So, I picked up GalCiv2 plus expansions.  From what I've seen it has a learning curve that is even more daunting than Sins.  I can't wait!

[Aez]

Are you sure about the missing ship design?  I loved galciv 2 allot, I tough the systems were well designed and balanced.  I didn't finish a single game because ship design felt grindy.  It's nice to customize the ship style, but having to upgrade every model manually evertime I had a new component was abusive.  At the end, with a stable political map, I was basically advancing the turns really fast until the next upgrade, then advance, then upgrade.  meh.

It's too bad because the strategy was amazing.  Nothing like playing a neutral the diplomat while bribing the monkey psychopath with technology to have him annihilate your enemies.  Protecting minor races for tech and trade, having one huge ship turn the tide of a war, etc, etc.

Great game, a pain to play.

[NiX]

Are you sure about the missing ship design?

They took it out intentionally to make it easier.

[Strazos]

Are you sure about the missing ship design?  I loved galciv 2 allot, I tough the systems were well designed and balanced.  I didn't finish a single game because ship design felt grindy.  It's nice to customize the ship style, but having to upgrade every model manually evertime I had a new component was abusive.  At the end, with a stable political map, I was basically advancing the turns really fast until the next upgrade, then advance, then upgrade.  meh.

It's too bad because the strategy was amazing.  Nothing like playing a neutral the diplomat while bribing the monkey psychopath with technology to have him annihilate your enemies.  Protecting minor races for tech and trade, having one huge ship turn the tide of a war, etc, etc.

Great game, a pain to play.

Do you mean you have to redesign the ship with each component upgrade, or complaining that the ships already in the field do not receive the new hardware automatically?

The latter simply makes sense, especially from a balance standpoint. As to the former, there's an option buried in there somewhere to keep your designs static, allowing you to quickly modify models whenever you get a piece you want to put on your new ships. As I don't have the game installed currently, I cannot tell you where this option is, unfortunately.

[Aez]

[
Do you mean you have to redesign the ship with each component upgrade,

That. 

Maybe I missed an option.  Every time I was getting a new component, I uploaded  my original design and had to reassign guns, sensors, engine, etc.  It's not that long but it's still a pain.  Especially when it's a new engine or armor and you want to add it to multiple ship blueprints.

The upgrading system was much better.

[Stormwaltz]

Do you mean you have to redesign the ship with each component upgrade,

That.

As an aside, that was why I didn't play Firaxis' Alpha Centauri all that much. Redesigning all my units every dozen turns - and then trying to weed old designs out of my build list - was an obnoxious bore.

[Tannhauser]

That crazy tech tree weaned me off AC.  "You have now gained Obsequious Technophage" or some shit.

[Sky]

As an aside, that was why I didn't play Firaxis' Alpha Centauri all that much. Redesigning all my units every dozen turns - and then trying to weed old designs out of my build list - was an obnoxious bore.

There were decent options for automating that stuff. I used to hate it and was messing around years later and figured out a way to make it not-very annoying. I don't remember exactly now, it's been a couple years since I've played.

[Stormwaltz]

That crazy tech tree weaned me off AC.  "You have now gained Obsequious Technophage" or some shit.

Ethical Calculus. That one was so conceptually preposterous to me, I made fun of it on Noveria (sadly, that conversation was cut - Liara was to interject, "There's no such thing as ethical calculus!")

[Jobu]

Edit:  Also, after playing Sins I realized how much I missed games set in space.  I have had a huge passion for cosmology since I can remember.  So, I picked up GalCiv2 plus expansions.  From what I've seen it has a learning curve that is even more daunting than Sins.  I can't wait!

Same with the space games for me. But I never liked the GalCiv series because their maps are too open. There are no chokepoints or strategic fronts. Just a huge, black morass of space. Obviously that's nice and realistic, but makes for a very sloppy strategy game. I'm finding Sins much much better because of the way the planets are all connected by phase lanes. You can pile up guns and ships at one junction, and keep all your goodies tucked away on the other side of the planet. That was always missing from GalCiv2 for me.

[Lum]

Ethical Calculus. That one was so conceptually preposterous to me, I made fun of it on Noveria (sadly, that conversation was cut - Liara was to interject, "There's no such thing as ethical calculus!")

Yeah, well, after the skys are burnt black in the Mathematical Wars, you'll PRAY for ethical calculus, bucko!

[Lum]

Oh, and on topic, until I figured out that people could bid on the pirates to attack someone, I was very unhappy. WHY DO THE PIRATES KEEP ATTACKING ME AND ONLY ME I DO NOT UNDERSTAND 

[Murgos]

I bought this on Sunday (Sin of a Solar Empire, not the derailer).  DL was quick and painless, install was uneventful and ~10 hours later I was going, "I gotta stop and go to bed, I have work in the morning.  Let me just get those pirates first."

And of course as soon as I did that the AI opponent (small map, 1 star 14 planets, random, 2 players, easy AI) warped in a rather impressive 4 cap ship fleet with LOTS of support.  Which then immediately turned around upon seeing my fleet and hauled ass back.

I guess it was trying to get the pirates as well and didn't know I was there?

Anyway, very fun, "just one more thing" engrossing game play.

[Kitsune]

The AI has very firm ideas about winning and losing propositions; if it thinks it's outmatched it'll haul ass out of the system on the spot.  There've been a couple times where a fleet would pop up to one of my worlds, the AI would send a 'Haw haw, you're fucked!' message, and my fleet would arrive at the same planet seconds later completely by coincidence, and the AI would run.  I wasn't even trying to fight, I was just moving to point B and dropped a disorganized pile of ships in its lap and drove it off.

Unfortunately, the AI isn't so good at a risk vs. reward prediction.  There've been a few times when it had one of my capital ships down to a sliver of armor, but retreated before killing it after its fleet had sustained enough damage to make it appear significantly weaker than mine and trigger that 'run away' code.  When if it had stuck around for just a few seconds longer, it could have dealt me a significant blow before retreating.

[bhodi]

There've been a couple times where a fleet would pop up to one of my worlds, the AI would send a 'Haw haw, you're fucked!' message, and my fleet would arrive at the same planet seconds later completely by coincidence, and the AI would run.

You can abuse this with one of the TEC commandships that has the ion cannon. Bolt his mothership and the rest of the fleet will abandon him. Level 2 bolt is enough to cancel the buildup to jump indefinitely.

When you start getting into this game, you'll realize that it's really not very deep at all. :/

The only thing you do with new colonies is click a few buttons to build extractors and population.
Research is fixed and there is no way to speed up / slow down / reallocate resources.
There is no end-game combat strategy but blobbing.

Hopefully, modding and future patches will solve some of this blandness.

[Murgos]

There is no end-game combat strategy but blobbing.

Not sure what this means.  Just because you can blob everything and send it in at once doesn't really mean that's the most efficient use of resources.

One tactic I've been using is to make two fleets, one a heavy assault fleet (Battleships and heavy crusiers) and another a support fleet (Carriers and missile frigates).  Drop the assault fleet in a minute or two earlier, let the enemy get entangled and then jump the carrier fleet in behind them.  Very effective and lets you do more with less.  A similar sized fleet just 'blobbed' in will get massacred against a fleet that the above tactic can handle easily.

Additionally there is a lot of strategy in designating targets, finding choke points or prioritizing your invasion schedule based on which planets provide/deny the most resources and other such considerations.  Against a human player there is much to consider because it's pretty easy to move a fleet through a defended planet and into the rear area for hit and run attacks.

There is even ship level tactics, as far as prioritizing targets, get the Cap ships first?  Go after the, weakly defended, carriers?  Just let them scrum?  Ignore the defenders and nuke the planet?  Kill off logistics improvements first.

Meh, there's lots of strategy and tactics even for 'blob' combat.

[bhodi]

Well, it's no homeworld.

Yes, you want to mix your fleets a bit, but really, once you have more than about 60 ships on each side, prioritization is pretty pointless - even cap ships pop pretty much instantly.

There is a lot of strategy involved, but as far as tactics go, this game is kind of a disappointment.

[nurtsi]

I played two games on the small map, one with TEC and one with Advent.

The game feels like a simplified Supreme Commander in space.

[GenVec]

There is no end-game combat strategy but blobbing.

I was unsure of the game when I first picked it up, mainly for all the same reasons you mentioned. The more I play, however, the more I like it. Note that I haven't touched the single player and don't intend to - 3 to 8 person FFA is where the game really shines. There's no joy like telling your ally to attack an opponent while hiding a fleet in a nebula next door to his homeworld, and delivering a massive coup-de-grace in one strike.

The idea that there's no strategy involved is, quite frankly, untrue. It's mainly a system of counters; knowing which units deal which type of damage and have which type of armor. You can find an easy chart describing that here -> http://www.crimsonsky.com/images/Sins-Ship-Damage-Chart.jpg

In the late game, it is very easy to pop cap ships if you have a huge fleet, but generally only when the enemy hasn't taken any precautions. Every fleet should be accompanied by several battlecruisers in support rules, recharging shields and providing immunity-like abilities as needed. A straight up group of carriers or battleships will find itself swarmed under.

As I said, the more I play, the more I like it. My one complaint is with culture, especially the Advent superweapon - firing off a once-every-five-minute megacannon should do more than just give me a 4% shield mitigation boost next time I fight in that system.

edit: and damn is it pretty.

[Sairon]

I think there's a lot of potential here, but first of all it's way to easy to just jump away with units, it should be impossible to space jump if you're being fired on. And secondly it's just way to slow, at least on normal speed, I'm gonna give fast a spin today. Otherwise it's mostly goodie.

[Stormwaltz]

I'm having trouble finding a boxed copy (which I prefer). None of the stores in Edmonton have it, and Stardock's mail order only uses UPS International, which means they charge ridiculous shipping to Canada. The game might be good, but I'm not certain I'll find it $70US good.

[Merusk]

I'm having trouble finding a boxed copy (which I prefer). None of the stores in Edmonton have it, and Stardock's mail order only uses UPS International, which means they charge ridiculous shipping to Canada. The game might be good, but I'm not certain I'll find it $70US good.

That's what.. $40 cdn?

[schild]

The collector's edition box that i ordered from the dev website just came in. It's a nice package.

[Kitsune]

I did a three-player FFA today, me against two AIs on a medium map with two solar systems.  They put up a hell of a fight; whenever I would go to stomp one, the other would usually come knocking with a big fleet.  I eventually wound up abandoning a sizable number of less-important worlds to their grisly fate to free up enough of my ships to keep the valuable planets protected while I went around stomping the AIs.  It took a loooong time, but protecting only the most resource-heavy planets let me expand out to other good planets and get on top of the resource game, then build enough ships to take out the other two players.

And yeah, in my experience, mixed fleets are the way to go.  I strive to get one of each capital ship into space ASAP; a fleet consisting of the five capital ship classes is very hard to stop.  Rather than just pump out damage or fighters, they repair and buff each other while debuffing the stuff they're fighting, it's a much more powerful combination.  The Advent also has some supremely useful cruisers, one that absorbs damage given to ships around it (and has enough shields to pull that off without exploding in seconds), and another that cripples enemy frigates and repairs friendly ships.  Stick a handful of those cruisers in with your capital fleet and dust a sprinkling of the basic frigates (which can steal power from enemy ships and give it to yours), and you wind up with a hellish juggernaut of pain.

Another thing I learned early on: don't dismiss the colonizer capital ships.  Having a big, decently-armed ship that can colonize worlds is sooooo helpful, and they usually have some other great abilities on the side that will buff the rest of the fleet.

Protect and level up your capital ships.  They get a special ability at level 6 that's usually far more powerful than their usual abilities, plus they get more powerful with each level.  Level 10 capital ships are terrors, so do your best to keep them from getting blown up in the lower levels.  I'd sooner sacrifice a planet than lose a high-level capital ship; you can always get the planet back, so don't be shy about retreating if your ships look like they'll blow before your opponents' will.

[Moaner]

I think there's a lot of potential here, but first of all it's way to easy to just jump away with units, it should be impossible to space jump if you're being fired on. And secondly it's just way to slow, at least on normal speed, I'm gonna give fast a spin today. Otherwise it's mostly goodie.

You can build jump inhibitors which slow down the rate at which ships can escape a gravity well.  They are not as useful as I'd like but they help.  I'm hoping they mess with them some more in coming patches.

Also, I think I read they are working on implementing a speed slider which can be adjusted during a game.

[Strazos]

I really want to try a demo of this before plunking down monies.

[NiX]

You can build jump inhibitors which slow down the rate at which ships can escape a gravity well.  They are not as useful as I'd like but they help.

Um, what? I've managed to wipe out fleets using inhibitors. Even if they don't allow me time to get a fleet into the system they're jumping from, it does give me time to get the fleet in place to jump on top of them or even time to build another inhibitor close by to slow them down while my fleet intercepts. Throwing up an inhibitor and as many hangar defenses as you can is great way to defend a system.

I was playing a game where a guy jumped through one of my systems heading into my home planet and my fleet was sitting a system away ready to jump in, so I waited till he jumped into my home planet and came in behind him. He had 4 level 6-7 cap ships and with all the bombers he didn't leave with any of them and if not for the inhibitors he probably would of been able to jump back where I didn't have an inhibitor or as much hangar defense.

[Tannhauser]

Ok I'm gonna buy this later today and try it out.  I hope this is not another 'Sword of the Stars'.

[Stormwaltz]

That's what.. $40 cdn?

Right now the dollars are at parity, but for the past four months a CDN$ has averaged 97 cents US.

When I moved here a Canadian dollar was worth about 80 cents US.

[Merusk]

You need to hit at least 88mph if you're  going to attempt to jump the sarchasm.

[Draegan]

Anyone still playing this game?  Looking at some new games recently and I'm curious about the longevity to it?  How long did you guys play before you moved on to something else.

[Sky]

How long did you guys play before you moved on to something else.

Hi. You have read f13, yes?

This is not the place to gauge longevity. If a forum could have ADHD, this is it.

[Mrbloodworth]

Anyone still playing this game?  Looking at some new games recently and I'm curious about the longevity to it?  How long did you guys play before you moved on to something else.

I play it every once in a while.