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[Sheb]

Only if it has shields I think.

[EuchreJack]

Is there a way to "downgrade" my ship armor?  Currently, ship armor defaults to "Composite" as that is the most advanced armor my empire knows.  However, "Composite" used Neutronium, whereas "High density Duranium" does not.  And I currently have no Neutronium.  Thus no new ship designs, as they require a resource I desperately need for other purposes (such as expanding shipyards and repurposing shipyards).

[Greenbane]

I don't think you can downgrade armour. Only upgrade it.

[Svampapa]

E: I've built a PDC on Earth but it keeps saying that it's 'run out of fuel'. Do I need to give them fuel tanks or something?

At first I thought PDCs were orbital installations, but from what the wiki tells me they are bases on the ground.

Doesn't really make sense, but it would explain why it wouldn't let me add any engines in the design window. I guess the game treats them as engineless ships on the ground, but it would still make more sense to have these things as orbital defence platforms. At least to me.

In any event, I forgot to remove the fueltank on my design. So I just refueled it via the misc toolbar in the ships window. That stopped the "has run out of fuel" spam in the event log. Might be impossible if your design doesn't have any tanks to refuel though.

[Earthquake Damage]

Is there a way to "downgrade" my ship armor?  Currently, ship armor defaults to "Composite" as that is the most advanced armor my empire knows.  However, "Composite" used Neutronium, whereas "High density Duranium" does not.  And I currently have no Neutronium.  Thus no new ship designs, as they require a resource I desperately need for other purposes (such as expanding shipyards and repurposing shipyards).

You can unlearn a technology, though you'll have to research it all over again in the future.  Go to the research tab, select the appropriate category (Defensive System in this case), look at Completed projects, find and select Composite Armour, then hit Remove.

That works for pretty much any technology, though I wouldn't use it for Expand Civilian Economy tech (rounding errors likely), and I don't know how it'd work for production modifiers (e.g. Mining Production 20 tons).

[AlStar]

At first I thought PDCs were orbital installations, but from what the wiki tells me they are bases on the ground.

You can make orbital installations (although I think they're forced to be civilian), you just need to research the 'Orbital Habitat Module'.

Alternatively, a ship with no or very few engines is basically an orbital installation, although then you've got to build it in your shipyards, and it'll require maintenance.

As for the "out of fuel" problem - like Svampapa said, make sure that you didn't put a fuel tank on it - unless you're using shields, they don't need fuel. If you have given it a fuel tank, you can tell it to refuel under the 'ships' panel, select the PDC, then go to the 'Miscellaneous' tab, and you can transfer fuel there.

[Cheese]

After finding a second race of NPRs who also did not want to communicate, I decided to go into SM mode and SM communications between us to see what actually happens when it works. Apparently, they are the Precursors. I now regret this decision, I hope it doesn't mess anything up, like causing the Precursors to become my eternal, loving friends or something, however interesting that might be. Do precursor wrecks appear randomly or will those have been an NPR fighting with them?

[Earthquake Damage]

Doesn't really make sense, but it would explain why it wouldn't let me add any engines in the design window. I guess the game treats them as engineless ships on the ground, but it would still make more sense to have these things as orbital defence platforms. At least to me.

PDCs get 4 extra layers of armor.  They don't require maintenance.  PDC-only beam fire controls have 50% more range.  PDC-only missile launchers reload twice as fast.  Supposedly they also use the planet's missile stocks as if they were their own, so they don't need magazines.  I haven't tested that last bit since I don't trust it.

They also have some penalties:  They're immobile, can't use shields or cloaking devices, and their beam weapons are always penalized due to atmosphere (since they're, you know, on the ground)

[Cheese]

They are also built by your industry and you don't need to worry about fuel, speed or maintenance, so you can make huge planetary weapons platforms, albeit still with a fairly high cost.

[Earthquake Damage]

Do precursor wrecks appear randomly or will those have been an NPR fighting with them?

I'm not sure.  I think I've seen them appear even when running a game with precursors but no NPRs, but those may have been swarm wrecks.

[Micro102]

What is this genetics research? I don't feel like I will ever use it but one of my starting scientists has it so I humor him and give him one lab.

[Cheese]

When you research the genome, it allows you to research alterations to your races genes that give them wider habitability tolerances. For example, you might decide to research a 5% increase in temperature tolerance. These won't take effect straight away though, as far as I know you need to make a new species in the component design screen and/or build a gene modification centre on your planet to actually make use of it.

[EuchreJack]

After finding a second race of NPRs who also did not want to communicate, I decided to go into SM mode and SM communications between us to see what actually happens when it works. Apparently, they are the Precursors. I now regret this decision, I hope it doesn't mess anything up, like causing the Precursors to become my eternal, loving friends or something, however interesting that might be. Do precursor wrecks appear randomly or will those have been an NPR fighting with them?

Relax, the Precursors have an additional negative diplomatic modifier, so you can't ever become friends.

[RedKing]

I tend to build a few fuel tanks into my PDCs (or more accurately, armored fuel bunkers) just because I use them as fortified hangars for planetary defense fighters. True, I could skip that and transfer fuel directly from the population stores, but it's more automated (and realistic) to have in the PDC. Ditto for magazines, otherwise you're force to go in and do a lot of "Reload from Ordnance From Colony" orders and/or manually transfer missiles from the population stores to the launchers each time you fire a salvo.


As to genetics, I tend to ignore it, but one of the three subfields can be very useful: Gravity modifications. Temp and Oxygen level are less so, because both variables can be modified (albeit slowly) with terraforming. No amount of terraforming will change gravity, however. And unlike the other two, you don't simply get a penalty to colony cost, you can't colonize it *at all* if it's outside your race's habitable range for gravity. So if you come across a lovely large, mineral-laden planet...that just happens to clock out around 2 Gees of gravity, it's inaccessible to you. Unless you can cook up a batch of modified population that can tolerate higher gravity.

[forsaken1111]

Is there a way to "downgrade" my ship armor?  Currently, ship armor defaults to "Composite" as that is the most advanced armor my empire knows.  However, "Composite" used Neutronium, whereas "High density Duranium" does not.  And I currently have no Neutronium.  Thus no new ship designs, as they require a resource I desperately need for other purposes (such as expanding shipyards and repurposing shipyards).

If you still have an old ship design using that armor you can copy it and just design that to whatever you like without upgrading the armor.

At first I thought PDCs were orbital installations, but from what the wiki tells me they are bases on the ground.

An orbital installation is just a speed 0 ship parked at a planet.

PDCs get 4 extra layers of armor.  They don't require maintenance.  PDC-only beam fire controls have 50% more range.  PDC-only missile launchers reload twice as fast.  Supposedly they also use the planet's missile stocks as if they were their own, so they don't need magazines.  I haven't tested that last bit since I don't trust it.

I think reloading from planetary stocks takes longer though as it uses the cargo loading time rather than ordinance reload time.