Bay 12 Games Forum

One thing I think that some might be neglecting is that pro-Russian Ukrainian rebels don't necessarily need to get military hardware from the Russians (though that certainly seems to be happening right now), since there is a fair amount of defection from Ukrainian police/military forces, and the hardware they use is quite similar to that used by the Russians. Some of this defection is because the soldiers/cops in question are actually supportive of secession, but some is because the Ukrainian army is barely supplied and poorly paid, so some may well defect simply so that they can feed and protect their families. In the event of an actual war, the Ukrainian army in its present state would crumple like a paper towel in the face of a strong force like that of Russia, but it's so large and unwieldy that it is extremely vulnerable to internal defection, loss of supplies, and so on.

I don't know why people ask how to make 2 races like each other. I had completly oposite problem.
By the time the second group of techs got unlocked i had all races in a federation but Acutians (starting race, so thousands of negative influence) and Boarines (because "how the hell do i get them in"). However only Thoraxines were in constant war with Acutians (by me intervening and saving Thoraxines a few times) and I somehow easily managed to get Burlust to invade Boarines.
By that time everyone had super high RGI (I thought there was a limit of 100 mentioned in one of tutorials) of 200+ and everyone loved each other out of admiration. I spent decades hurting relations to get a second race join a war (you can't pay them to join a war unless they have negative relations), but when i tried third admiration points were building up faster than i could hurt them.
Left the game. Why the hell would i play it if i can just make federation with every surviving race 20 years in game by not doing a thing. Will try again in a few months time, but I associate Arcen with fixing by removing features (anyone remember top-down city managment in Valley Without Wind?). Their only game i liked was Skyward Collapse.

If everyone loves everyone else, use the Andors or Skylaxians to invite the Acutians into the federation, since your influence with the Acutians is irrelevant that way.

Welp, I tried my first game, and after about two hours of playing, here are my thoughts:

-Space combat is okay, but very cluttered. Thus far, it's basically come down to me randomly flying away from the gigantic storm of bullets, clicking the right weapon to get through shields/hull, and periodically using a "super ability".

-There is a lot of complexity, but a disproportionate amount of it seems kind of meaningless and irrelevant to what actually happens.

-The way features are slowly taught to the player is interesting, but I feel kind of aimless, just flying around attacking pirates and clicking "Help with research" on certain planets. I don't really know what I should be doing or where I should be going, since early game there is very little to do.

-There is a lot of repetitiveness too. I stole every tech from the Acutians in the exact same level, with a space station on one side of the map and a bunch of ships on the other. I did the exact same thing each time (switch to blasters, rush the station), and received the exact same result (shield goes down a turn before I jump out to safety, enemy weapons can't pierce hull).

-Honestly, there's too much "click on this button to marginally increase the stats of Race X while a lot of time passes by" and not enough actual stuff happening. I also feel like my ship becomes more and more obsolete each time I do this, and I don't see a way to make it efficient at all.

I want to love this game, I really do. The concept is basically something I've been looking for for ages, and it's only really been done by Space Rangers (which was a bit buggy, poorly translated, and had a slow end game) and Drox Operative (which, to my understanding, is a grindfest). I just can't say I've seen anything about it that's incredible, though. Hopefully late game will improve my view.

Actually, at least for federal benefits, there is no real breakpoint in the current system (Earning more never results in less income), but the marginal tax rate (How much the state takes from every extra dollar, including benefits cut) reach 95% at some point. Source: An article in the Economist I read in paper.

Still, one advantage of a universal income (or of generally merging benefits) is that it's easier to design the system right.

By the way, does anyone has data on what percentage of the cost of benefits program goes to administration and overhead?

Income doesn't get cut by the increased taxes, but welfare payments definitely do.

I just won my first Stealth B game by switching to a Vulcan early on. It's a pain to deal with high evade ships, but it always wins in the end so long as you max out defenses (and with a Stealth ship, it's practically designed to build as many engines and shields as needed to defend). The only issue was the charge running out when the system gets hit with a missile, and even that wasn't too bad.

Get Cloaking. Whatever ship you're playing, no matter what strategy you're using, you should pick up cloaking at some point, for the one sole reason that it makes the Flagship fight so, so much easier. It's stupid how much it helps against the flagship. Use it to dodge the drone surge of stage 2, the laser surge of stage 3, and the triple missiles from all stages. You don't even need it fully upgraded (although it helps), you just need it activated for a brief moment when you want to dodge any volley that could inflict damage to you.

Failing that, at the very least you need something to deal with the triple-missile spam, whether it is cloaking, defense drones, bombing the launcher, or a boarding team. That missile launcher ends runs. If you don't have a way to avoid it (like cloaking), it is your number one priority target in all stages, and if you can't take it out fast enough, it's likely going to be the prime cause behind your death.

Somewhat on this note, I discovered that the Federation ship can now use cloaks. Suffice to say, this makes it absurdly effective at taking out just about anything, and it might even beat out the Mantis B for overkill ability.

Eh, they thought he reflected badly on the company, and they didn't want him to be CEO (which is basically the "face" of the company). It's their decision, and there really isn't anything wrong with it.

Though just to gauge the directions people are coming from, would your views change if he was fired for supporting gay marriage, or donating to a specific political party, or supporting the ACA, or something like that?