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[Loud Whispers]

Galatia Academy probe package retrieval mission:
Added description of where the probe will be found
Excluded certain terrain (system-wide nebula and very large ring systems) from list of possible locations

These were long overdue. I still have nightmares about that one probe from several runs back that was way in the boonies of a system-wide nebula.

"Probe is located some distance away from the centre of the star system"

WHERE ARE YOU WALDO

Black market trade can now fill demand

This seems interesting; not sure if I'm for or against it yet.

I'm all for it. But really I want there to be more sense of "scale" to reflect how much larger bigger planets are compared to smaller planets, and for planets to have budgets which they actually use to settle trade balances & buy prereq materials

[Mephansteras]

Yeah, a deeper economy simulation would be nice. I know Alex is more focused on it being a combat and exploration game, but trade is a natural avenue that people want to do as well. Maybe that'll be something he spends more time on once the game gets to 1.0 and all of his current 'core' systems are done.

[Loud Whispers]

Yeah, a deeper economy simulation would be nice. I know Alex is more focused on it being a combat and exploration game, but trade is a natural avenue that people want to do as well. Maybe that'll be something he spends more time on once the game gets to 1.0 and all of his current 'core' systems are done.

Plus it's something he had attempted before, which I think would add vast tons of depth to the game, all whilst helping better integrate player planet economies to the wider sector. Right now supply chains being disrupted doesn't really have any ripple effects, because there are no supply chains. But just imagine how cool it would be to have a much more viable roleplay experience as an independent trade captain. Some pather cell conducts a terrorist attack on a high yield ore world supplying the hegemony with cheap ore. Hegemony doesn't have cheap alternative supply because of bad relations with the Persean League and Sindria, pays a higher price from Tri-Tach corporation and the Luddic Church. Then the price of Hegemony made metals, machine parts and supplies goes ever so slightly up, whilst Persean League and Sindria ever so slightly down, boosting their market access and temporarily boosting their profits. Plenty of opportunities for the player to take part in a moving economy, rather than being the messianic CEO around whom the stars quake

[Mephansteras]

Yeah. While being able to be the uber-captain who can set up an empire to rival the Hegemony's power in just a few cycles is fun, you don't always want that out of a run.

More options to meaningfully act as a small player in the sector would be welcome.

[Loud Whispers]

Yeah. While being able to be the uber-captain who can set up an empire to rival the Hegemony's power in just a few cycles is fun, you don't always want that out of a run.

More options to meaningfully act as a small player in the sector would be welcome.

Indeed. It's actually pretty hard right now to not end up snowballing into a juggernaut. Something like Sunless Seas (starsector and sunless seas both have a lot in common in their core gameplay loop of sailing around from port to port getting into hijinks), where in sunless seas you can work your way towards establishing your first colony but it's hard as hell and doesn't just automatically lead into being the world devouring megacorp

I think some more work into planets actually having to buy/sell things and transport them would also help with the whole issue of player empires being too snowbally. If there was more depth in what planets did:

1. Founding your first colonies would be more interesting, so there'd a bit more involvement than just "I have 2 million in the bank and 1,000 crew in the tank." This would tie into the whole idea that planets don't just automatically teleport supplies in, but actually have to import those supplies with money from somewhere, and resources from somewhere. So a nascent colony that has nothing to offer is going to be much harder to start up until it has a mining or farming industry set up. [As a side note, maybe also have it be that smaller planets take longer to attract pirates and hostile attention? It seems kinda ludicrous that my outpost of 1,000 people has large pirate armadas the same day the colony is founded]. Colonising in Duzahk would be a lot easier than colonising at the galactic rim.

2. Planets could have their own separate budgets from the player, and how the player chooses to profit from the planet would be up to them. You could have a very simple mechanic like players drawing their own salary from the planet, with the obvious balancing act between growing the planet and profiting from it. It would also allow the player to have very profitable planets without just being flooded with millions of credits every month. Sometimes you just want some planets for their productive capacity and for rent-free port storage. This kind of balance would also mean players who still want to make Hegemony-crushing empires can still make one, but also that it'll be less common for players to just accidentally become one

[WealthyRadish]

I remember being taken aback by the over-simplicity of the economy when it was first announced, though in practice my only real complaint with the economic system is how static the total market value is (especially after the change removing player-owned planets' contribution to demand).

I think the static "hazard rating" of planets is also a problem. In my campaigns I've ended up neglecting setting up any colonies until most of the sector is explored, by which point there's little left to do in the game. It would feel much better to settle for a crap planet early on, knowing its hazard rating sources could be reduced later by some means (I think there's one way to reduce the effect of cold/dark planets in this version, but that's it).

The other main gripe is the questionable punitive expedition system from other factions, but it looks like that will addressed very well in the next version.

[Great Order]

To be fair, Alex isn't wanting the game to be about colonising. The systems are all meant to feed back into combat in some way or another.

The extra systems are there to add greater depth to the combat focus, not to be their own systems. He discussed this when he was creating the hazard system, I believe.

[Loud Whispers]

To be fair, Alex isn't wanting the game to be about colonising. The systems are all meant to feed back into combat in some way or another.

The extra systems are there to add greater depth to the combat focus, not to be their own systems. He discussed this when he was creating the hazard system, I believe.

I think the best way to go about it is making combat fun and rewarding so players seek out combat. Cos realistically, if players weren't babysitting colonies, they'd be playing the game, raiding convoys and exploring the stars

[Frumple]

It would feel much better to settle for a crap planet early on, knowing its hazard rating sources could be reduced later by some means (I think there's one way to reduce the effect of cold/dark planets in this version, but that's it).

For what it's worth, it does, and mods add a pile of them. There's pretty fully fleshed out terraforming options among the colony related mods in existence, up to and including building your own hyperspace shunts.

I'm not sure if something or another lets you build entire star systems from scratch, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was. You can definitely get close to it with nebula systems and the options that let you turn gas giants into stars.

[feelotraveller]

Colonising in Duzahk would be a lot easier than colonising at the galactic rim.

Probably not in the next version 

Penelope's Star is now claimed by the Luddic Church, and Duzahk/Tia-Tax'et by the Hegemony

The systems are all meant to feed back into combat in some way or another.

Yes it is another game as random combat generator.  (I always get bored, given enough time.)

Weirdly, or not, the punitive expedition system reminds me of the earlier versions (pre world activation) of DF sieges.  Yeah, a bit of fun for a while but then just endless grind.

[Loud Whispers]

Colonising in Duzahk would be a lot easier than colonising at the galactic rim.

Probably not in the next version 

Penelope's Star is now claimed by the Luddic Church, and Duzahk/Tia-Tax'et by the Hegemony

takes off hegemony captain hat

puts on pirate helmet

[Great Order]

Update's out, bring out yer dead mods!

[Mephansteras]

I'm hoping it won't take much if any work to update most of them, since Alex says that this update is save compatible with 0.96.

But I guess I'll find out this evening when I start migrating mine.

[Great Order]

Hmm, you know I've been seeing some Fun Stuff in the Persean-Orion abyss from other people. I've not got there myself yet, I started a game without the boost from the Galatian Academy stipend so I'm a bit strapped for resources right now, but still looking forward to seeing what horrors lurk there.

EDIT: Yep. Can confirm. Abyssal hyperspace is freaky.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In Limbo, I found a mothballed cache guarded by derelicts, including a Guardian, and a mining station with nothing but heavy machinery and transplutonics. I've found a few rogue planets, first had nothing, second an abandoned mining site that had been filled back in to look as natural as possible, the third has an outwardly-pristine but internally-fucked Falcon orbiting it. There's also Abyssal Lights that you can scan for increased sensor range, or interdict for increased burn speed (Since abyssal hyperspace reduces burn by 3/4)

[Great Order]

There's currently been some kind of amusing drama in the modding scene.

Someone, we'll call them A, created a mod called Take No Prisoners. They made it open source, allowing anyone to mod it in any way they wanted. Someone else, we'll call them B, proceeded to fork the mod into an NSFW mod. I don't know the details, but I'd imagine with the OG mod it'd be a wee bit rapey.

A didn't like this. At all. Seriously. He threw all the toys out of the pram and not only stopped working on TNP but pulled it from the forums and removed every link to it. Ironically, this only left B's NSFW mod to do the same thing, so anyone wanting TNP's features was now forced onto it.

Realising that people were now using a mod that he didn't like in larger numbers, A decided the best way to fix that was to then add malware to his other mods. From then on, if one of his mods detected B's mod it'd crash the game and corrupt the save. Hilariously, the code it detected was in the TNP mod too, so what happened was anyone running the OG mod *or* the NSFW one was unable to play with any of those mods.

This was an unpopular move. Once this was discovered the guy was promptly banned from the forums and the subreddit, and Alex basically had to alter the modding rules to include "Don't make malware you fucking idiots". Meanwhile, the unofficial Starsector Discord had the mods act as insane as Discord mods do and they were praising him for it... Right up until they realised people didn't like that where they then temporarily then, I assume reluctantly, permanently banned him from the server.