KickStarter Terra Invicta - sci-fi grand strategy from Long War mod creators - now available on Early Access

[Grotesque]

did they changed how the unification works with the latest patch?

Before the patch, I was able to unify Europe and Russia with all the territories each had a claim on.


Now I unified Pacific States and Argentina as Pacific States had a claim on it.

And then when I try to unify Indonesia and Pacific States, the former Argentina territories break away.

 

[Jaedar]

did they changed how the unification works with the latest patch?

I don't think it was latest patch, they've been nerfing megastate unifications over several patches. I'm not sure what the restrictions are though, I never did chain unifications.

 

[Grotesque]

did they changed how the unification works with the latest patch?

Before the patch, I was able to unify Europe and Russia with all the territories each had a claim on.


Now I unified Pacific States and Argentina as Pacific States had a claim on it.

And then when I try to unify Indonesia and Pacific States, the former Argentina territories break away.

https://www.chaptercheats.com/cheat/pc/492629/Terra-Invicta/hint/172582/

 

[Riel]

Isn't this beautiful?

A gravity assisted path to Mercury, this kind of realism makes this game very special. A pity its supposed main dish, "realistic" space battles, falls short at the moment. Let's hope they do something to improve them.

Anyway, it's a game with a very step learning curve, specially at the beginning with very bad documentation, but it's a nice ride.

 

[ropetight]

Isn't this beautiful?

A gravity assisted path to Mercury, this kind of realism makes this game very special. A pity its supposed main dish, "realistic" space battles, falls short at the moment. Let's hope they do something to improve them.

Anyway, it's a game with a very step learning curve, specially at the beginning with very bad documentation, but it's a nice ride.

I hope they tone down or make easier espionage/diplomacy Risk on globe, so space part of game gets more pronounced.
It takes too much at the beginning to get to the space - it is very possible that when you learn strategy better it gets easier, but it just seemed too much to me.
Also, I haven't played alpha in couple of months, maybe things have already changed.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

I hope they tone down or make easier espionage/diplomacy Risk on globe, so space part of game gets more pronounced.

nope, every change they did was in the opposite direction, they want you to struggle on the planet, always, constantly, you must suffer.

 

[Jaedar]

I hope they tone down or make easier espionage/diplomacy Risk on globe, so space part of game gets more pronounced.

nope, every change they did was in the opposite direction, they want you to struggle on the planet, always, constantly, you must suffer.

They are working on a way to automate some councilor actions. And adding a new module for space that increases your control cap.

But yeah, the mid/endgame were already kind of a drag (not just because of earth management), and most of the changes since launch have made it more so.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

and starting adding more features.

they considered it feature complete already one year ago. which is a couple patches ago. drop any hope.

 

[Jaedar]

Terra Invicta is really an special game

It really is, but it's also kind of bad at showing it. They (apparently) do a lot of really cool indepth physics simulation, maneuver planning, etc under the hood but it's really easy to miss.

The game gives you a lot of early game trash tech, and normally I love me some early game trash tech, but there's no reason to use that shit when the aliens are so much stronger and will stomp you instantly, and there's just no reason to attack the other human factions in space yet.

Yeah. You build a few trash ships to take out an alien scout for the story objective (for applicable factions), but then there's barely any point to build more ships until you've gotten some endgame weaponry and ship sizes.

 

[Joggerino]

Yeah. You build a few trash ships to take out an alien scout for the story objective (for applicable factions), but then there's barely any point to build more ships until you've gotten some endgame weaponry and ship sizes.

This was my issue too, just an avalanche of tech you'll never use.

 

[Riel]

In theory early game should be about fighting other human factions for space resources while trying to stay under the radar from the aliens, in practice AI human factions are very peaceful in space. No one has ever attacked my bases and while I keep a few ships just in case above Mars and Earth I have only ever used them to attack, never to defend.

Space game would be a lot more lively if human AI sent assault transports with Ion Engines to your asteroid bases from very early and you had to take defensive measures to counter it. Earth's orbit though should have an special status, at least until certain point in the game, making it an atrocity to attack other human faction there.

In the current state the game the dance is very obvious, hide from the aliens, develop technology, spam huge ships and hope it's enough soon enough and basically ignore human factions in space (*). It's very anticlimactic compared to the huge potential this game has.

(*)In my current game I wasn't doing too well in the early game and I lost the race to Mars to the Academy that claimed not just the best spot in Mars but the best fucking spot in the whole Inner Solar System with productions ranging from outstanding to great on all resources but Fissiles, I was disapointed because as The Initiative I wasn't looking for a fight with The Academy and I expected if I took it by force things could spiral out of control, in the end it turned out I just had to write a big enough check and The Academy was all too eager to sell the base to me. The price was high, but to be honest in the long run it was a bargain.

TLDR: Can be fixed in more ways than adding more features, AI is retarded and balance is off. If everything is fine tuned I think it can be made to work in a very enjoyable manner.

 

[Jaedar]

AI human factions are very peaceful in space. No one has ever attacked my bases and while I keep a few ships just in case above Mars and Earth I have only ever used them to attack, never to defend.

I think a large part of it is that the ai factions don't aggro easily, killing stations counts as an atrocity, and the hard part about getting to space is paying the mission control and upkeep, not the initial resource cost. There's just not much incentive to attack someone's martian or lunar base unless you see crippling them as a goal in itself. And it's probably good that the AI doesn't consider crippling the player a goal in itself by default.

And once you get to the asteroid belt and beyond, there's basically 0 reason to ever seize anothers station compared to just building a new one on your own, because there's infinitely many tiny rocks to go around. Mercury and maybe earth orbit are the only truly valuable real estate in the solar system, and earth orbit tends to be really volatile since aliens shoot shit down, and enemy councilors seize assets.

Earth's orbit though should have an special status, at least until certain point in the game, making it an atrocity to attack other human faction there.

Agree, combat in earth orbit should have large reputation penalties as you are endangering the satellite grid by creating debris.

I think part of the problem is also that space and earth feel very disconnected. On earth you're basically illuminati, ruling from the shadows, but space flies no national flag, only secret org flags.

 

[Riel]

And once you get to the asteroid belt and beyond, there's basically 0 reason to ever seize anothers station compared to just building a new one on your own, because there's infinitely many tiny rocks to go around. Mercury and maybe earth orbit are the only truly valuable real estate in the solar system, and earth orbit tends to be really volatile since aliens shoot shit down, and enemy councilors seize assets.

In my second play through I made the solar system smaller and it changed things quite a lot, suddenly rather than a gazillion asteroids there was like 30 or so, many of them barely profitable due to very low yields or them being water+volatiles which are over abundant, but getting noble metals and fissiles was a different thing, hell even regular metal was scarce until Mercury opened up. Of course the AI was still not doing anything about it but but scarcity alone did put pressure on me to claim the best spots which proves the game has potential for interesting early game play without huge changes, just tweaking AI and balance a bit and it will be fun.

But this game really needs that, or something else that improves its playability/challenge, because despite all its potential it is basically a purposeless solo sand box at the moment. You basically have one fight that matters, the first important fight against the aliens. If you are defeated you are done because at this stage they will be in total war against you and after wining the battle they will start cleaning your mines and stations including your space yards, so no more ships ever again, and if you win you are set for a long grind but it is unlikely the aliens will ever manage to put together a stronger force than the one you just beat.

All in all getting to that point is what? 30~ hours of early and mid game without any serious challenge, a huge difficult battle which is very cumbersome to control thanks to the terrible user interface and after that another long grind cleaning and hunting a gazillion small alien fleets across the Solar system... it's a disappointment



On the good side of thing I believe this game can work fine just by improving AI, tweaking its behaviour and a few balance changes.
And oh yes, did I mention the User Interface sucks?? I think it is confirmed they are working on its more glaring problems.

So here is hoping they get it right in the future.

 

[asfasdf]

This combat movement system got to be the most retarded thing I have ever seen in a game

 

[Jaedar]

This combat movement system got to be the most retarded thing I have ever seen in a game

Why? I agree it's overly complex and hard to manage (but I think there's now intercept and match course commands, which should help a lot). It's also very cool that it sticks so close to newtonian physics.

 

[asfasdf]

It is not complex, it is trivial if you are not a moron. The retarded part is having to set the direction and speed of every fucking ship every few seconds. Imagine doing that for 20 ships in a stupid rts, while using the worst ui ever designed. And no, you can't just tell ship go here. I can't imagine the autism required to think this is reasonable.

Sticking to newtonian is only seldom a perk. In most cases it is just lazy and unfunny.

 

[Riel]

Yes, combat is a little bit retarded... it is supposed to be realistic, but then it expects you to pilot 20~ ships simultaneously. I mean you are either the admiral of a fleet and give general commands to all the ships in your fleet or you are a ship captain and you have to command your ship, but not both.
I haven't played in a long time so I imagine the match speed and chase commands are useful to some of the most retarded and time wasting situations I used to be in, but still charting each ships movement is not the role of the admiral. You should be giving general command to ship groupings instead.

 

[ropetight]

Yes, combat is a little bit retarded... it is supposed to be realistic, but then it expects you to pilot 20~ ships simultaneously. I mean you are either the admiral of a fleet and give general commands to all the ships in your fleet or you are a ship captain and you have to command your ship, but not both.
I haven't played in a long time so I imagine the match speed and chase commands are useful to some of the most retarded and time wasting situations I used to be in, but still charting each ships movement is not the role of the admiral. You should be giving general command to ship groupings instead.

It is hard, almost impossible to mix tactics with grand strategy, let alone simulation on top of all.
Too bad, I had hopes about this one, but it will probably turn out to be over-ambitious mess.

 

[Doctor Gong]

Is this game still not fully baked, or is it worth a chance?

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

it's still the same game, with the additions you expect from an alpha and the bugs you expect from an alpha, with a lot of features you expect to be taken off from an alpha but are still there.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

i read they're splitting more nations. this is the greatest news ever, because what the game truly needed were more unreachable shithole countries where you can't reach the already nigh invincible alien troops.
also i welcome more larping traps for those poor noobs that don't understand that india-china is the only viable way to (sometimes) win.

 

[mediocrepoet]

also i welcome more larping traps for those poor noobs that don't understand that india-china is the only viable way to (sometimes) win.

You mean in order to win, you have to kill all the Indians and Chinese? This game sounds awesome!

 

[asfasdf]

You can easily win going yuro route. AI is too stupid, aliens throw their troops away in silly fashion. Also, countries mechanics are too awful on late game, with endless coups.

The true difficulty naturally is enduring the atrocious ui, prosperous space battles and whackamole late game politics without losing your sanity. Only the truly autistic can endure enough to reach endgame.

 

[Jaedar]

Also, countries mechanics are too awful on late game, with endless coups.

It's not hard to protect big countries. Just run a few unrest decreasing missions every now and then. If you have lots of small countries you can't prevent the coups lategame, but arguably that's your punishment for poor play.

also i welcome more larping traps for those poor noobs that don't understand that india-china is the only viable way to (sometimes) win.

India does seem to be the objectively correct long-term strategy. Don't have to combine it with china though.

 

[thesecret1]

The only difficult part of countries is tardwrangling everyone to make sure alien lovers don't start flinging nukes. After that, it's just tedium. Would love to be able to eliminate a faction once it loses all its influence, ships, and space bases - all it can do at that point is be annoying, and there's no good reason to keep it around.