Having been playing the public beta for several days, rather inactively, I've found myself doing reasonably well - which to be honest was quite a surprise. Having spent some time conversing with my beta galaxy mates tho I have realised why. It is not in anyway down to my abilities but merely the fact that I, compared to 75% of the people playing actually have a rough idea what I should be doing. Many people say "read the ****ing manual" but sadly in this case that is "****ing useless".
The current manual gives (bad) basic outlines on what each screen does, but does not really explain why it does what it does, nor does it actually help a player to understand what he or she should be doing. So as my personal effort into saving/reviving PA so this "new era" does not die before it begins I have basically written my own manual, which will hopefully give a lot of people an idea on how to actually play PaX. Obviously there are a few holes, some of the things I say may be slightly incorrect or have recently been changed, but in essence I hope it will give the general player that reads it a better understanding of 'new PA' and how it can be played on a basic level, with moderate success.
I don't mean to step on any toes or be insulting, but to be honest the current manual is the worst I have ever seen - and this is for a new completely different game. Fair enough the manual may still not be finished, but with every passing day PA is losing players who play the beta and think "**** this" - never to return. Also before a mod decides to move this to the Strategy forums, I felt it should be posted here as it is not simply 'strategy' but is a (very long) post pointing out a major flaw in the current set up of Planetation and is a 'general help' item as opposed to specific strategy.
Anyway enough of the whys and whatfors, here we go:
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Overview:
This as in the past is where you can see your Fleet, Roids, Messages of the Day etc. This round there is a vital change. Many people have noted the lack of a Galaxy Status. This is because it is now directly on your overview. The system is not that easy to read at first nor is it the best designed, but in any case it is there. Firstly to avoid confusion any incoming ships you have are displayed at the top of your screen in the format "XXXX INCOMING HOSTILES" or "XXXX INCOMING FRIENDLIES". Further details can be found further down your screen under the "Incoming Fleets (Me)" section.
Incoming to the galaxy is listed under the "Incoming Fleets (Galaxy)" section. The "Fleet" indicates the name of the incoming fleet (not the Planet name) so in essence is actually completely useless information. The "Location" is the coords of the incoming fleet (i.e. defender or attacker) and the "Target (eta)" is obviously the targets coords and eta of the incoming. The rest of the screen should be self explanatory.
It is important to note several things early on too. All ship types are the same eta and all ships in galaxy are always eta 5. Ships attack and defend for 1 tick only, so landing etas need to match exactly (The 'delayed launch feature' is handy for this).
News,
Messages,
Galaxy Forums and
Com Unit are all self explanatory and have nothing new that requires explaining.
Politics:
Slightly different to last round, the number of votes aren't listed, you can vote for yourself and the person with the most votes is GC. Not actually sure how its decided if the votes are level, I assume the person who is current or was GC first is made GC. With that out the way its time to point out there is no resource bonus for GC or Ministers anymore. So what can a GC and ministers actually do? Not a lot really. Set Message of the Day, appoint your ministers and change the galaxy's name and banner. MoW seems to have no functions at all, except for changing the Message of the Day, MoC is the same as previous rounds (I assume, no actual experience) and can send mass mails, MoD has the most functions - being able to control the galaxy fund (more about that later) - both the MoC and MoD can ofc also change the Message of the Day.
Alliance:
All members of the same in-game alliance will get a one hour travel time bonus for defending each other and will automatically be stopped from launching on others. If you leave your in-game alliance you will be unable to reapply for 48(?) ticks tho. Alliances can set members at levels HC, BC, PR Officer, Member and Recruit, then set Arbiter access for each level. HC and BCs can use set the Attack section and also get better information from the Defence section. My knowledge of this section is a little limited, but I know enough to know that most major alliance will hardly use any of its functions, simply functioning as they have done before, but all signed-up to the same alliance for the travel time bonus and the Alliance Rank feature (see Universe screen).
Research:
This is very different to previous rounds. Which researches you do are now not dependant on constructions you have or have not built (as with old PA), you can ofc still only do one research at a time and the further down each 'branch' you go the longer that research will take, but all branches are available from the start.
Propulsion Branch - As with before, reduces travel time out of galaxy by one tick for each level.
Refining Techniques Branch - Sets the limit on the number of mining constructions you can build.
Production Branch - As with before, allows production of bigger and better ships (requires construction of at least one factory for each level)
Wave Transmissions Branch - Same as old scan tech tree, scans are different this round tho.
Tactics Branch - Makes more advanced tactics available for use with your fleets in combat.
Agent Training Branch - Makes more advanced covert operations available.
Asteroid Mining Branch - Increases the number of asteroids you are able to mine. Note that it doesn't matter how many roids you have, this is the limit to the number you can mine for resources. Also the best Research to start with.
Constructions:
Constructions are structures you can build on your planet surface to aid you in several areas. It is important to note that these structures can be destroyed (and targeted specifically) in attacks. Only one construction can be built at a time.
Light, Medium & Large Factories - At least one of these factories is required to be able to produce ships at their respective levels of research. While there is no advantage to having more than 1 of each factory, it does mean that should your only factory at a certain level be destroyed you will be unable to produce these ships until you have rebuilt the factory.
Wave Amplifier - As with the old wave amps, these increase the chances of your scans succeeding.
Wave Distorter - As with the old wave reflectors, these decrease the chances of incoming scans on you succeeding.
Metal, Crystal & Eonium Refineries - Resource mines increasing income by 1000 per tick of their respective resource for each one built. The number of mines is limited by the level of your Refining Techniques Research.
Research Laboratory - Reduces the amount of time it takes for researches to complete. Effect is cumulative but the more you build, the less effective each new one will be (i.e. its definitely not 1 tick less for each one built).
Finance Centre - Increases your income, each one adds a small percentage bonus to income from your mined asteroids and refineries. Effect is cumulative but the more you build, the less effective each new one will be.
Security Centre - Makes it harder for people to successfully covert op you (see below). Effect is cumulative but the more you build, the less effective each new one will be.
Production:
As before the place you build your ships. All orders for a tick are placed in a 'Production Set' and there is a maximum number of 'Production Sets' that you can have building at any one time (I think 5 but not certain) - so be careful if you have a habit of building 10 of each ship every tick or something like that. Orders can also be cancelled before they have finished and resources are returned, but an amount is deducted from the resources you get back (call it a non-refundable production charge if you like)
Also important to note that each race has similar ratios of resource cost throughout their entire production line. Xan ships all cost an even amount of each resource, Terran ships cost more metal, Cathaar ships require more crystal and Zikonian more eonium. In addition there is no fuel cost for ships anymore. All ships also have the same build time, as well as travel time.
Engineering:
This is where you can choose 3 priorities for your planet to receive a slight bonus in. Obviously the first priority gets more of a bonus than the second and so on. You are also able to set a certain type in more than one priority slot to have an even bigger effect on that area. Priorities cannot be changed for 48 ticks once set.
Mining - Bonus to resource income.
War - Bonus to ships effectiveness in combat.
Production - Reduced time to produce new ships.
Construction - Reduced time to build new structures.
Research - Reduced time to research new technology.
Security - Bonus to covert ops resistance.
Waves:
As before your scan page. This time tho scans you make are stored for you to return to and see later (not sure how long they stay in your 'database') and a link to the scan is given so it can be shared with others. My personal experience with scans, especially the later ones is low, but from what I understand a "News Scan" will not show information from the previous 4 ticks of the game, a new type of scan called a "Jumpgate Probe" will only work if you have a fleet heading towards the planet you are trying to scan and will show all hostile and friendly ships also heading towards that planet ('enhanced news scan' it seems) and the equivalent to military scan, the "Fleet Analysis" allows you to get exact fleet composition details of fleets heading towards your own planet only.
Mining:
Unlike before you no longer have to scan for roids. Roids are initiated by paying an amount in that resource (i.e. a metal roid costs metal, an eonium roid costs eonium to create). Bear in mind tho that the amount of roids that can be mined is dependant on the level of your Asteroid Mining Research.
There is also a Galactic Fund that the MoD has greater control over (i.e. can stop people taking anything or specific resources out) and an Exchange Resources function that allows u to exchange your surplus resources, but be wary of the 25% tax placed on this feature.
Fleets:
This is where you can name your fleets (YES! You can now call your fleets whatever you want and it will appear on your targets overview!) and move ships between your fleets.
Missions:
This screen is where you set the tactics for each of your fleets and send them out to attack/defend. Options include the standard 'attack' and 'defend' (altho this time both are restricted to one tick afaik - so defence especially has to be sent to land at the correct time) as well as a 'fake attack’, which will automatically recall your fleet just before it lands, and a 'support' option which tbh we have no idea what it does. In addition to this (and to make the timing of defence easier) there is also an option to delay the launch of your fleet several ticks, so for example you can choose to send an attack in 5 ticks time or launch a defence next tick instead of having to get up/remember to launch.
The actual launching of fleets is also different. It no longer matters when during a tick a fleet is given the command to send as all fleets will be launched automatically 'on the tick' - effectively meaning launch times will no longer be at xx.55 but at any point during a tick. The launches do not show on your targets news until the tick either.
Tactics can also be set for each fleet (these need to be researched) and allow you to tell your fleets to specifically concentrate on a certain area, be it Roids, Enemy Ships, Enemy Structures or a Mix. A Primary and Secondary priority can be set and, as with Engineers these can be same for added effect.
Covert Ops:
These are basically like employing spies or saboteurs to 'attack' an enemy planet. As would expect the effect of these operations is not very big, but when used in coordinated 'attacks' could prove valuable. Covert Ops missions must be researched via the Agent Training Research and include things such as stealing resources, destroying asteroids, ships and structures and resetting research projects to the beginning. You will have two ratings in this section, one that gauges how successful your covert operations will be (which decreases with each one you do and 'recharges' over time) and one that gauges your planets 'alert level' or ability to prevent and catch covert operations against yourself (this increases with each covert op done against you and drops again over time).
For each Covert Op you launch you must choose the number of agents that you want to 'hire' for the task. The more agents you send the greater the 'effect' of the operation, but also the greater the chance of them getting caught. Naturally it costs resources to perform covert ops, 1000 of each resource per agent sent.
Galaxy and
Universe are both self explanatory and pretty similar to before.
Combat:
Quite different to before really, but also quite simple, but also the thing most people are having problems with. Ships have a class (FI, FR, CR or BS) and target one class each, ships do not target any other class except their target class. There is no EMP/Cloak/Stealing, all races have conventional 'shooting ships'. There is no initiative - all ships fire at the same time.
If a ship does not have its target class to shoot at it will instead fire on Structures on the planet, each ship also has a rating for this. There are no pods anymore, all ships are capable of capping roids. Capping is determined by 'disturbance' - this means that if a ship isn't being targeting too heavily it will cap roids. The best way to look at it is if your pilots are busy trying to avoid getting shot, they don't have time to steal roids, but if they aren't under fire they have more time to go after the roids.
Scoring System:
Altho no exact details have been released it seems that the main way to gain score is either thru stealing roids or killing ships. Exact details I am not certain on, but there is definitely a higher score gain if you steal roids (and possibly kill ships) from a planet bigger than your own, where as the points gained from similar actions on a smaller planet is considerably less. I think (altho am not certain) that score can also be lost from being roided. Score can also be gained from successful Covert Ops and successful scans, altho these are very small.
There are also two types of 'score' on the Galaxy screen. One is "Value" which is the equivalent to last rounds networth, as I gather takes into account the number of ships, constructions, roids, resources etc you have. The "Score" is points gained in the activities mentioned above as well (I think) as an additional set of points determined by the your "Value" or networth. The Universe screen rankings are determined by "Score" with the "Value" amount determining whether a planet is too small or not for you to be able to attack. Not the easiest system to understand really, but it works in the way it is intended.
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If you spot any flaws in my explanations, have anything to add or any such things please do comment, no doubt I have missed several things. This was posted as an explanation of our game to both new players who wish to know more and existing players who are having trouble making the transition. If you have anything else to add that will aid in that goal please add it!
Anyone that bothered to read the entire post, I hope you now feel you understand PaX better and will therefore enjoy it more as a result.
This has been my effort on behalf of Planetarion. If it helped just one person then thats made it worth while (altho tbh putting everything I know about it down on paper has helped me understand it a bit better anyway
).
2 small things though:
Linear Mode
