Questions

[Paul M (OP)]

A question relating to surveys and NPRs.  I have probed two systems in SM mode and got the SM only message that there are alien ships and colonies present in the system.  My survey ships probed the terrestrial worlds and found nothing.  I checked the race list and no new race had shown up.

Does this mean there are pre-cursers there only?  Or do I have to go in as SM and make the NPR?  I would have no idea which world in the systems is their homeworld or anything about them mind you so I am somewhat confused.

As a suggestion differentiate the SM message between NPR and precursers, if it is not much work.

Any help on this one appreciated as I am baffled by what is going on.

[Hawkeye]

A new race will show on the intel screen only after you get an active scan of a ship/base of theirs

With computer controled races ON, you will never get any alien race in the race list/view race page, as you are not supposed to play/tweak them anyway.
Hm, on second thought, you might, if you create the race manually.

NPRs and Precursers may establish listening posts on asteroids/moons, so looking only at habitable planets is not enough. A cheat that worked in my game (unintentional, I haste to ad  ) is to turn ON "Show Exclusion Zones" on the system map, which will then show the exclustion zone with the planet/moon/asteroid with the alien base in the center.

With computer controled races OFF, aurora will start the "create race" routine (just like when you created your own race at games start) whenever you enter a system with a NPR.
With computer controled races ON, you will never have to create a race, aurora will do all the work.

[Paul M (OP)]

I am playing in SM mode during a probe so that I will see what it going on in the advent I have to step in as SM, I have precursers turned on but NPRs are not computer controlled.  So does the fact that in the SM list of races there is no additional race means this is just more precursers?  I am very uclear how this works with regards to NPRs when you want to be able to control them at the moment.

When you enter a new system with an NPR and NPRs are not set to be computer controlled does Aurora make up a new race?  

I would guess so since otherwise as the SM I would not know where to place it or what its values are even.

Color me confused over this topic.

[sloanjh]

I am playing in SM mode during a probe so that I will see what it going on in the advent I have to step in as SM, I have precursers turned on but NPRs are not computer controlled.  So does the fact that in the SM list of races there is no additional race means this is just more precursers?  I am very uclear how this works with regards to NPRs when you want to be able to control them at the moment.

When you enter a new system with an NPR and NPRs are not set to be computer controlled does Aurora make up a new race?  

I would guess so since otherwise as the SM I would not know where to place it or what its values are even.

Color me confused over this topic.

Open the F9 screen for the system in question, and look for populations, e.g. "alian race, 238 million".  If you see one, and don't see a new NPR, then you need do race generation, just like you did when you set up your player race.  In other words, the way that it used to work is that Aurora would put the NPR population on the planet, but you'd have to do race creation.  It sounds like this may still be the case for computer-control of NPR OFF.

John

[Paul M (OP)]

F9 is the system details screen (the one you get for clicking the sun button in the system view F3)?

Assuming* this is the case then there were no alien populations and this was just more pesky precursers.

I had a precurser vrs DSSV slaughter in a lvl 6 nebula.  I didn't see the precurser till it was at 24,000 km then 25cm/V5 rail gun rounds started impacting for 5 damage.  I have to think on this a bit since in principle I'm almost at the point where I could send in my Daggers and fight back (since the daggers may be faster due to their thicker armour belts).  But the precursers likely fire every 5 s.  All told things are slowly happening, I'm still in the build up of my duranium surplus phase but my efforts are starting to yield small surpluses I can send a freighter for out stystem.  It just sort of means a lot of my homeworld industry lies idle due to a lack of duranium (I have a 1000 point min I try to keep).  It is still often faster to pick up the duranium, cart it home, build facilities and ship them back to the colony then to let the colony build the facility.  But at least there seems to be a light at the end of the duranium flow tunnel.

The nebula keeps getting bigger...currently it's 6 system in extent and I'm not finished exploring all Jump points (well the system with the precursers is going to need to be liberated first).  Just none of this is very inspiring to be writing it up.  Most exciting thing other then yet again having a DSSV killed by precursers is when one of my Beasts of Burden II's after a 2.5 year journey (and about two months from home) blew up.

Just got the next level of interior armour and am working on composite armour...my leader is a +30% research (Defences) so I am getting a bunch of them done (interior armour 2, comp. armour, 35% signature and damage control).

*assume means "makes an ass out of you and me" but I think we are safe as F9 strikes me as the system details.

[Paul M (OP)]

Two (actually four) questions on damage control:

1.  What does it do and does it need spares to do it?  It is clear that it fixes stuff but I'm not sure about the mechanics mainly.

2.  Is it worth putting it on a PDC and if you do do you need to add in spares?

Is there any way to select which type of armour you want to use, other than the best stuff you have?  I looked but didn't see anything other than the button at the bottom and that gives you the best you have.

When building facilities, for example a fabrication factory, you have cost: 120 and duranium: 120.  Is my thinking that cost is in Aurora Monetary Units (AMUs) and that the build time is 120 given by the sum of the minerals?  So if I have build capacity of 2400 per year it would take 1/20 of a year (3 5-day periods) to complete?

Can you use mixed shields on a ship?

Just as a side note: a 1000 kg missile moving at 12,000 km/s has the kinetic energy equivelent of 170 kTon of HE, or is about the equivelent of 11 Hiroshima scale nuclear weapons.  For the most part detonation of the weapons warhead is not required in planetary attacks, so less radiation but the dust would still be an issue.

[Steve Walmsley]

Two (actually four) questions on damage control:

1.  What does it do and does it need spares to do it?  It is clear that it fixes stuff but I'm not sure about the mechanics mainly.

It repairs systems on the ship, except for armour, and it requires double the number of spares that would be needed to fix a maintenance failure. The percentage chance of repair is equal to:

((Length of Increment / System Cost) * Damage Control Rating)/10

Examples:
If you needed to repair an engine that costs 30, the increment was 60 seconds and the damage control rating was 1, the chance would be: ((60/30)*1)/10 = 0.2%
If you needed to repair a sensor that costs 50, the increment was 300 seconds and the damage control rating was 2, the chance would be: ((300/50)*2)/10 = 1.2%

If the damage control rating was 10 in both cases, the chances would be 20% and 12%. So the major effect of the damage control rating is the speed at which systems can be repaired. Each engineering system adds one the damage control rating. Each damage control system adds 10 to the rating, improved damage control adds 20, etc.. A high damage control rating is useful for a warship because it allows repairs to be made fairly quickly.

2.  Is it worth putting it on a PDC and if you do do you need to add in spares?

Yes and yes.

Is there any way to select which type of armour you want to use, other than the best stuff you have?  I looked but didn't see anything other than the button at the bottom and that gives you the best you have.

No, at the moment you can only choose the best armour.

When building facilities, for example a fabrication factory, you have cost: 120 and duranium: 120.  Is my thinking that cost is in Aurora Monetary Units (AMUs) and that the build time is 120 given by the sum of the minerals?  So if I have build capacity of 2400 per year it would take 1/20 of a year (3 5-day periods) to complete?

Cost is in Wealth and the build time is based on the cost. While installations usually have mineral cost = wealth cost so it makes no difference, with refits the cost may be higher than the amount of minerals required. If you have a build capacity of 2400 per year then each 5 day increment will provide 5/360 (days in Aurora year) x 2400 = 33.33, so it will take 4 increments to build a 120 cost factory.

Can you use mixed shields on a ship?

No, just one shield type. This is avoid design and gameplay headaches where different shield types have different recharge rates.

Just as a side note: a 1000 kg missile moving at 12,000 km/s has the kinetic energy equivelent of 170 kTon of HE, or is about the equivelent of 11 Hiroshima scale nuclear weapons.  For the most part detonation of the weapons warhead is not required in planetary attacks, so less radiation but the dust would still be an issue.

The radiation effects of bombardment are as much for gameplay reasons as anything else. I wanted to avoid the Starfire situation of wiping out the population with a saturation bombardment on Monday then shipping in your own colonists to the still perfectly habitable world on Tuesday.

Steve

[Paul M (OP)]

Thanks Steve, back to the PDCs are they otherwise repaired by ground based industry?

The cost probably then goes on to explain why it kept taking longer to refit the DEs then the DDs.

As for GFFP, yes its worth avoiding.  It was rude to put it mildly.

[ShadoCat]

As for GFFP, yes its worth avoiding.  It was rude to put it mildly.

You'll just have to go with Dan's modified GFFP using ground forces.

Or terraformers.  I bet they can't build infrastructure quicker than the Imperial Terraforming Corps can remove oxygen from their atmosphere!

Kurt

[Paul M (OP)]

Well indeed terraforming can be used offensively.  The war agains the Chtorrh books were basically humanities response to that...err sorta, kinda.

I have a xeno team on a ship but when I give it an order to drop off the team it won't.  Does there have to be a colony present to drop off the team or what?

[Erik L]

I have a xeno team on a ship but when I give it an order to drop off the team it won't.  Does there have to be a colony present to drop off the team or what?

Yep

[Paul M (OP)]

Thanks, I was starting to come to that conclusion but an aweful lot of the writing made it look like you could drop them off on an uninhabited world.  I will cobble together a small colony with loads of infrastructure to colonists and send them there then.  It's a heck of a good team so I want them working...rating is 185 or so.  The only real problem with the place beyond it being a bit far from home (5 jumps or so) is that it has 0 minerals.  I'm hoping there will be enough stuff found in the ruined settlement to make the mining colonies needed to support it.  What to the rest of you do with habitable but no-mineral worlds?

On use terraformers aggressively the best plan is to add something deadly (SO2 for example) since even a small fraction makes the world x2.  I'm impressed with my Draakfroming so far 2 of the 3 worlds have breathable atmospheres (if only just) and one of them is probably inside of 10-15 years from going x0...it is more complex as I have to add N2 to thicken the atmosphere, add anti-greenhouse to keep the temperature comfortable (actually cool it off since it is a bit warm but still in the range of comfort), and then add O2 to get breathability.  I am not sure what would happen if I dumped in the O2 first as it would go over 30% and so I'd rather avoid upping the colonization cost.  The other one is getting its 80% H2 atmosphere switched out to 40% greenhouse gas, 35% N2 and 5% H20.  The last one well it has 9.9 atm of CO2, 0.16 atm S02 and 0.062 atm 02 (added)...the plan is to remove the S02 (its down from 0.19) then to start working on getting rid of the CO2...but this is likely decades or centuries of work.  Surface temperature is 450 C or so...and the civilian's keep dumping people and infrasrtructure there.

[James Patten]

I think you misunderstand - you need to designate as world as a colony.  In the F9 system window, click on the planet you want.  There's a button on the bottom row that says somethink like "make colony".  Click that button, the world becomes a colony, and you can place teams there.

[Paul M (OP)]

Indeed I did...well that is a darn sight easier then getting 20,000 colonists there!  Thanks a bunch.

[Paul M (OP)]

Back to the maintenance issues...and a big thank you for the "designate colony" information that is working just fine.  The team is busy demothballing the alien artifacts...no colony seems to make the progress slower though.

My questions is regards to frieghters/civillians.  Can you overhaul freighters without a civillian freighter facility?  I'm planning on establishing a maintance base as part of the expansion plans but do I need to build a freighter maintenance facility there or can I just use the standard maintance facility and the overhaul command for freighters?  Also do I need maintence facilities to maintain freighters or a civillian freighter facility?

Do the civillians build civillian spaceports on different worlds or just on the homeworld?  If so what do you need to trigger this?

I've almost got sufficient data from scanning for jump gate construction 180...but it has taken quite some time...probably close to a couple of years of scanning a gate.