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[Kagus]

So, in an attempt to find some sort of empire-management game, I tried out the demo to Lost Empire: Immortals.  I went through the tutorial, and did all the things like a good boy should.  Then I was sent out to do things on my own.

Skip forward a few turns.  I notice that I have two thirds the points of the lowest-ranked AI player, of the three minor races I have encountered I have been attacked by two (and the third one isn't too happy with me either since I was unable to fulfill his absurd request for almost twice my total mineral stores) and utterly whupped (mind you, I have done nothing but extend the warmest greetings to these contacts.  This does nothing, apparently, as one of my scouts was destroyed by a minor who was on friendly terms with me), I currently have four minerals to my name and three planets, none of which have anything close to a decent mineral supply (the only delicious mineral deposit nearby is owned by the one minor who *hasn't* yet attacked me), and the two prototype military ships I created were both nuked due to moronic combat AI (they flew straight forward while being tailed by one of the enemy ships.  The thing picked them off without a fight).

So, tell me...   Am I really just that bad at 4x games, or is there something I'm missing?  Is this standard early game fare, or is Immortals just that mean?  What's the standard sequence for the early turns of a game like this?


EDIT:  On an unrelated note, anybody know how to get EFS working on XP?  I keep getting this wonky memory error.  And yes, I've tried the standard registry edit.

[Pnx]

I remember that game being really heavy on the micromanagement, it wouldn't be so bad on smaller maps but when you reach the kind of scale that you have in most of the galaxies it can be a real pain.
My advice is go for mineral rich planets first and foremost, they're the most valuable planets in the game, food rich planets can support more colonies, but you need minerals to build anything so that comes first.
Put research into infrastructure and faster speeds of engine, that should allow you to scout and expand faster, you shouldn't be doing much weapon research for a while.

Oh and I always felt like I had a disadvantage early on, and I did have less points in a few of my games but once you get going and boost your economy to a decent level it generally gets better.

Now the thing that really annoyed me was the ship combat, I dunno, I guess it's a complicated and interesting system, but it feels so incredibly rock-paper-scissors-with many more options. You attack each kind of ship mostly with the kind of ship above or below it, and I had so much trouble figuring out what kind of ships the enemy was using.

[Nirur Torir]

So, tell me...   Am I really just that bad at 4x games, or is there something I'm missing?  Is this standard early game fare, or is Immortals just that mean?  What's the standard sequence for the early turns of a game like this?

I'm not sure what's up with the game's early difficulty, but once you get an early strategy that works, it gets easier. Most 4x games aren't as pointlessly unforgiving and confusing in the early stages.

The game can be fun, but it feels incomplete. Diplomacy is kinda pointless, since you just give away precious minerals while allies give you food. I've never bothered with it long enough to see if the minor races behave nicely eventually, but I doubt it. Fortunately, I've never seen the minor races do much beyond harass a few border worlds, despite them starting out with superior fleets.

As Pnx said, focus on finding and colonizing mineral rich planets. They tend to be rare, but don't over-expand on useless planets. For leaders, I advise keeping at least one miner, scientist, and farmer at all times. For combat technologies, I find it works best to only research one weapon type, and skip shields entirely. I don't remember much about my early strategy beyond that, but the game's pretty easy once you get your empire going.

[LordBucket]

Diplomacy is kinda pointless

There are very few 4X games in which diplomacy is useful. Just an excercise in telling a pretty graphic that you want to be friends, and then watching it attack you a few turns later.

[Granite26]

Diplomacy is kinda pointless

There are very few 4X games in which diplomacy is useful. Just an excercise in telling a pretty graphic that you want to be friends, and then watching it attack you a few turns later.

As it is in real life

Games with trade agreements tend to do a little better (since there's a cost to changing states that the players can understand)

[Kagus]

Well, just ran into the turn limit for the demo.  All in all, I was looking for an excuse to stop playing.  I'd finally managed to get the upper hand over the local minor races, and I was destroying their fleets with extreme prejudice.  It was mildly satisfying, but there's still this tiny niggling annoyance that creeps into the back of my head whenever you've cornered an entire species on their home planet, blockaded all airspace and then threatened with scorched earth-style orbital bombardment, and they STILL tell you to give them eighteen thousand mineral units as a peace fee.

Still though, makes nuking the buggers all the more entertaining.


Yeah, the only thing that kind of caught my attention with this game were the precalculated 3D battles.  It's a very nice idea, allowing you to have very pretty and interesting battles in a 4x game, one of the main weak points with that genre (plus, since it's AI controlled, I don't have to baby every single ship in every single encounter).  However, due to the dreadful implementation in this particular title, the idea fell flat on its face with such force that its nose exploded out its arse.


And yes, the diplomacy and trading aspects were weak as hell.  Somewhat annoying, as that's precisely what I was looking for.  Not more micromanagement (and even with just a few systems under my control, I started to see what an insane amount of that there would be).


So, yeah...  Not really my deal.  Anybody know of a game that focuses more on diplomacy and trading, and not so much on the rampant micro (seriously, why the hell should the prime ruler of a race attend to every freakin' matter of business in the known universe?  Isn't that what ministries are for?)?

[Nilocy]

When it comes to points you have to realise that the AI is prolly cheating on some minor level to make up for its AI. When ever i played Civ 4 the AI always had something over me. I enjoy being in second, it gives me something to strive for in a game. But when I start losing to a race thats over a thousand points below me I get pissed off.

Points don't really matter in the long term, its only an indication of how much stuff you have. What counts is how you use that stuff.

[umiman]

A lot of people make the mistake of treating 4x games like real life, expecting it to be a simulation of relationships in reality and getting angry when it isn't. They key is to treat a 4x game just like an FPS or puzzle game, with its own set of rules, relationships, and behaviour.

For example, while I might play Empire and GalCiv the same way (conquer the living world as fast as possible!!!!), I do it in completely different ways according to the rules of the games. In Empire, diplomacy is really, really short term where you should only do it to accrue short term benefits and ignore anything that requires a long term investment as they never work out. This is kinda the opposite of GalCiv. Furthermore, unit production in Empire is set so that everyone more or less has the same kinds of units, etc etc etc... I'm sure you know where I'm going with this.

The point is that you cannot take principles from real life into a strategy GAME. Like chess even. Do people seriously think chess mimicks actual warfare, diplomacy, or any aspect of real life other than memorizing tonnes of rules? It's different. Which is why I will say the key to being good at strategy games is the speed at which you adapt to the rules of that game's world.

[cowofdoom78963]

A lot of people make the mistake of treating 4x games like real life, expecting it to be a simulation of relationships in reality and getting angry when it isn't.

Guilty, its the main reason I dont like 4x games.


Also their strange determination to deny you any satisfaction in anything.

[Nilocy]

I always like the satisfaction of building a proper empire up and crushing people. Its so much fun.

[zchris13]

I personally prefer using a superweapon, and running it balls out all over my enemies, in truelly epic fashion.  Like the FATBOY tech level X thing from Supreme Commander. Damn that thing was awesome.

Then: TEABAG TEABAG TEABAG

[cowofdoom78963]

I've always hated super weapons, their sooo cheap...

[Kagus]

Something I tried in the demo of Sins but never really got around to fully realizing was the concept of economic dominance.

I focused almost exclusively on economic research and development, keeping only a capitol ship and a skeleton crew of other ships to shoo off independents from prime real estate.  When I came into contact with the more warlike AI players, I gave them lavish gifts and praise and they pretty much left me alone.

With my superior economical technology I was able to create a network of merchants and foundries allowing me to build up a powerhouse economy.  I made trade agreements with everyone else so I could feed off of their networks as well, and then used that leverage to ensure non-aggression pacts.

I buddied up with everyone thanks to my wealth, and if anyone started showing signs of mass expansion I'd sic the pirates on them with bounties the other player couldn't afford to pay off.  So while my "allies" were smashing into each other and wasting resources on the pirates, I was busy researching, expanding, and increasing my staggering reserves.

By the time the demo ended, I was making over twice as much of everything as the other contenders, and they had soft economies because they were used to asking for needed materials from me.  While they were busy throwing stick-and-stone ships at each other, I was well on my way to researching the seriously big guns.  My plan was to rush forward in research, stockpile a large force, and then cut off everyone else from my treasury.

Since they were still too busy fighting each other, their economies would collapse and I would be able to steamroll everyone with my superior tech.


It was quite fun, but like I said, I never got to try it out all the way to completion.

[zchris13]

I've always hated super weapons, their sooo cheap...

If by cheap you mean expensive as all get out, then yes. Yes they are.

[cowofdoom78963]

I've always hated super weapons, their sooo cheap...

If by cheap you mean expensive as all get out, then yes. Yes they are.

I do not.