Semi-Official 7.x Suggestion Thread

[Erik L (OP)]

Have at it.

[83athom]

Conditional orders/conditions. Condition; No Orders, Cannot Complete Primary/Secondary Order. Order; Land at Mothership, Transit Nearest Unexplored JP (Nearest unex JP with JG).

*Moved from v6.X suggestion thread.

[AL]

Since larger compressed fuel storage systems have recently been added, what about also adding smaller versions (ie small, tiny compressed fuel storage) for use on fighters?

[mtm84]

Option to randomly select a name from a list instead of going in list order.

[MarcAFK]

Theres many suggestions in the old thread I would love implemented, however the first new one is related to the system image pack I'm working on. I would like asteroid and comet images to be randomly selected from a pool like the other types, perhaps anything named ast1, ast2, ast3, etc.
And then theres a problem with the default images for the solar system, most glaringly obvious is I don't see an image for the moon and also that titan uses the same image as mars, several other planets use incorrect images, or even lower quality correct images than others already in the pack. And finally there's inconsistent use of what I think the default naming scheme is.
I have noticed that in random systems moons listed as chunk use the aXX.jpg, and non ideal terrestrial bodies and dwarf planets use the bXX.jpeg series, but in the solar system many terrestrial planets use the aXX images. This is a problem because in real life the 'chunk' bodies are generally either lumpy rock and ice bodies that haven't managed to become spherical or generally if they're larger than 1000 kilometers like the larger dwarf and terrestrial bodies theyre spherical, this applies to asteroids too, just take a look at vesta or ceres. So when my image pack puts pictures of asteroids and small moons as aXX.jpg several larger bodies in sol end up with images of smaller bodies. also i should note that there is no visual difference between 'chunk' moons and asteroids so perhaps asteroids should use thalle aXX.jpg series anyway.
Actually I notice a wide diameter range between chunk bodies and asteroids, perhaps any of these under 1000 kilometers should use the astXX.jpg lumpy images and the larger ones should use the aXX.jpg which would be the rounder but still dead grey bodies.


 I suppose I'm suggesting a complete overhaul of the images for the solar system so that at least the large terrestrial bodies everyone colonize will have the correct images, and that everything else could just have generic placeholder images.
I'm prepared to make such a pack myself if it will be integrated into a future version. Or at least I could suggest how the current images could be used more effectively.

[Thundercraft]

...I suppose I'm suggesting a complete overhaul of the images for the solar system so that at least the large terrestrial bodies everyone colonize will have the correct images, and that everything else could just have generic placeholder images.

I second the notion. The solar system, at least, should have correct images. Back in 2013 when I took a look at it, I hesitated to try making my own planet image pack because the system Aurora uses to select planet images seemed too confusing.

[MarcAFK]

I second the notion. The solar system, at least, should have correct images. Back in 2013 when I took a look at it, I hesitated to try making my own planet image pack because the system Aurora uses to select planet images seemed too confusing.

I seem to have gotten a handle on it, most systems randomly choose certain images for certain body types, but sol seems to have default images for bodies, which is often wrong or arbitrary. The only hesitation I have for suggesting an official overhaul is the fact that my image pack essentially steals images without proper licensing. I currently lack a stable enough internet connection to perform proper research, I know that nasa itself doesn't copyright images, but there are a dozen other places these pictures come from such as the ESA, etc, which may have different requirements and at minimum I need to write down the actual origin of each image and provide proper credit.

[Jumpp]

Suggestion: A button that causes the ships in a TG to redistribute ammunition among themselves such that all ships of the same class have got the same stuff.

For instance:
Cruiser 1: 40 Harpoon Mk2s, 40 Sparrow Mk2s (all antiship)
Cruiser 2: 40 Harpoon Mk2s, 40 Sparrow Mk1s
Cruiser 3: 40 Harpoon Mk1s, 40 Sparrow Mk1s
Cruiser 4: 1 Harpoon Mk1
Frigate 1: 100 Nike Mk1s (antimissiles)
Frigate 2: 800 Nike Mk1s

Then I push the magic redistribute-within-each-class button:
Cruiser 1: 20 Harpoon Mk2s, 11 Harpoon Mk1s, 10 Sparrow Mk2s, 20 Sparrow Mk1s
Cruisers 2-4: 20 Harpoon Mk2s, 10 Harpoon Mk1s, 10 Sparrow Mk2s, 20 Sparrow Mk1s
Frigates: 450 Nike Mk1s

States very like the first one above are common in my games. This is what I see when I have a fleet reload from a site that's got a mishmash of up-to-date and out-of-date ammo, and not enough of any of it. The Frigates, in this story, were both fully loaded, but the first one has expended most of its ammo while the other hasn't fired a shot.

You'd want to evenly distribute the ammo among the AMM frigates so that half your guns aren't offline. (In a perfect world, they'd load-balance their outgoing fire such that one didn't deplete way ahead of the others, but that could be complex and read/write intensive and this is a good workaround.) And you'd want to evenly distribute the ammo among the ASM cruisers so you can put together large coherent salvos.

You wouldn't always want this. Depends on the details of your fleet doctrine and the condition of your supply chain. But I often find myself doing this sort of tedious operation by hand. Automating it would be really nice.

[Erik L (OP)]

A check box in the Research tab that automatically allocates the maximum research labs to the selected scientist (while honoring the amount available)

[swarm_sadist]

I'm pretty sure I asked for this before but here it goes.

Automation of player factions. Being able to turn a player faction into an NPR while you work on another player faction means that multi-nation starts don't become so confusing. Alternatively, just automating certain parts would be good enough, like civilian contracts or research goals.

Also, an auto assign civilian administrators checkbox.

[db48x]

A check box in the Research tab that automatically allocates the maximum research labs to the selected scientist (while honoring the amount available)

It could even just assign as many as are available if the amount typed in is larger than the number of available labs, rather than showing an error dialog and then doing nothing.

My suggestion is that the unrest notifications shouldn't break automatic turns unless the unrest rises past a threshold, perhaps just 1%.  That would help for the usual case where the civlian lines alternately add colonists and infrastructure to a planet, causing the unrest to rise and fall my tiny amounts.

[MarcAFK]

Perhaps 10%, it would take a while to build up that far and if you're ignoring the event log that long it's your own fault.

[sloanjh]

Perhaps 10%, it would take a while to build up that far and if you're ignoring the event log that long it's your own fault.

+1

John

[Garfunkel]

Yes, no auto-break until unrest at 10%.

Add water to terraforming possibilities, so wasteland planets can be modified to have an hydrosphere.

[Steve Walmsley]

Since larger compressed fuel storage systems have recently been added, what about also adding smaller versions (ie small, tiny compressed fuel storage) for use on fighters?

Small and Tiny added for v7.1