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Birth of the Empires
- Thread starter The Dude
- Start date
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
pretty different. they have their own set of ships, buildings, troops, relationships towards those mentioned minor factions, diplomatic and intelligence bonusses, one race has got cloaked ships, others don't, and so on. So they have different mechanics, you won't see for example the cloak button with any other race. The AI is essentially the same global one for all players except for diplomacy AI which is custom-tailored to fit the specific race's historical roots and custom traits, but the AI is designed to take advantage of the given unique advantages each race has to offer, i.e. it tries to do the best with what it has got, e.g. you can steal ships from enemy empires and if you got hold of a cloaking-capable ship, the AI will use it correspondingly.
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
as far laying trade routes is concerned, I explained it a few posts earlier:
it should be self-explanatory since you see a line tagged to your mouse pointer and laying means just clicking on the planetary system in question, i.e. that of the minor or someone else you are befriended with.
it should be self-explanatory since you see a line tagged to your mouse pointer and laying means just clicking on the planetary system in question, i.e. that of the minor or someone else you are befriended with.
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
possibly around x-mas.
Upcoming is, among other things, a new start menu (looks a lot more like a game now) and the sixth playable race, the Omegans. They are quite challenging to play, different to all the others, mostly in case of diplomacy which works a lot more difficult for them but they were quite fun the last few days to play.
Upcoming is, among other things, a new start menu (looks a lot more like a game now) and the sixth playable race, the Omegans. They are quite challenging to play, different to all the others, mostly in case of diplomacy which works a lot more difficult for them but they were quite fun the last few days to play.
dragonfk
Erudite
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2007
- Messages
- 2,487
Malvoisin would you say that the game is worth playing now? Or is it missing too many features? Will it spoil my future fun with the 1.0 version? Or maybe will it scare me away from it?
Edit:
Don't get me wrong. I very much appreciate all of your teams effort. But there are so few 4X turn based strategies out there that I can't afford losing a promising title on account of bugs or similar problems related to alpha status of the game.
Edit:
Don't get me wrong. I very much appreciate all of your teams effort. But there are so few 4X turn based strategies out there that I can't afford losing a promising title on account of bugs or similar problems related to alpha status of the game.
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
I'd say yes to your first question. The differences to our 1.0 roadmap listed below are marginal in terms of programming work compared to what's already done in version 0.81 = Alpha 6.1, nevertheless will be adding to the fun overproportionally in my opinion so it's your decision. I don't think however that BotE is a game that is sensitive to a "spoiling factor" for that matter.
Bugs and crashes occur rarely, I doubt you encounter any in a long while according to the experiences of those giving feedback at our forums.
btw. I suggest downloading it from here (a german computer magazine software download section site with always the latest official release version): http://www.heise.de/software/download/birth_of_the_empires/72923
speaking of latest version, if you're into it and have MS Visual Studio 2008 and the MFC 8 libraries included there, you can also compile the latest development version bote.exe from http://bote.codeplex.com repository and copy it into your Alpha 6.1 installation folder. Newer graphic files will of course be missing and it could be that you need to alter a few files there like the Minorraces.data (open it in Notepad or Notepad Plus, a freeware program) which has a version number in the first line, but it might work without.
Edit: A rather complete list of things planned for 1.0 version:
Bugs and crashes occur rarely, I doubt you encounter any in a long while according to the experiences of those giving feedback at our forums.
btw. I suggest downloading it from here (a german computer magazine software download section site with always the latest official release version): http://www.heise.de/software/download/birth_of_the_empires/72923
speaking of latest version, if you're into it and have MS Visual Studio 2008 and the MFC 8 libraries included there, you can also compile the latest development version bote.exe from http://bote.codeplex.com repository and copy it into your Alpha 6.1 installation folder. Newer graphic files will of course be missing and it could be that you need to alter a few files there like the Minorraces.data (open it in Notepad or Notepad Plus, a freeware program) which has a version number in the first line, but it might work without.
Edit: A rather complete list of things planned for 1.0 version:
- User-definable galaxy creation parameters
- AI-Troop management
- Random events
- Ingame enzyclopedia and tutorials
- Some kind of super race like the Borg in Star Trek
- AI for minorrace ship movement
- AI for some minors to develop own colonies and also act partially as a major, i.e. invade others, make treaties with other minors
- Windowed mode for BotE
- Formula for ship combat crew experience gain
- User-settings for the auto-build governor
- The 3D combat part is worked on but there cannot be any ETA made for it so it is not part of our roadmap
dragonfk
Erudite
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2007
- Messages
- 2,487
Well as far as I am concerned I'd rather have a 2D combat than 3D. I just grew up with MoO and MoO2 and am having problems with adapting to nowadays standards 
.
Sadly I didn't have the time to try BotF, but I've got it on my disk and it's awaiting a moment of free time.
.Sadly I didn't have the time to try BotF, but I've got it on my disk and it's awaiting a moment of free time.
Raapys
Arcane
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2007
- Messages
- 4,960
I've been playing it a few hours. Doesn't seem to be all that many bugs, which is good. The UI could use some work though, you need an awful amount of mouse clicks to get things done. And speaking of getting things done, the micromanaging is kinda extreme having to babysit your systems constantly, watching their resources, their build queues and their worker assignments. I like the actual system you have in place, but the lack of any apparent automation as well as a click-heavy UI makes it very tedious when you have several colonies.
Maybe it could use some kind of optional automation thing which would let the AI handle the specific colony based on what you wanted it to focus on(research, mining, production, etc.)? An automatic resource trade to your own colonies would be nice as well, i.e. if a colony needed a specific resource it would automatically try and take it from the colony(or colonies) it was connected to. From what I could figure of the existing system, you had to manually transfer the resources even after connecting the two colonies.
Maybe it could use some kind of optional automation thing which would let the AI handle the specific colony based on what you wanted it to focus on(research, mining, production, etc.)? An automatic resource trade to your own colonies would be nice as well, i.e. if a colony needed a specific resource it would automatically try and take it from the colony(or colonies) it was connected to. From what I could figure of the existing system, you had to manually transfer the resources even after connecting the two colonies.
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
you can also use keyboard cursor left and right buttons or xtra mouse buttons to switch between systems in system build menu to reduce (additional) mouse clicks for example. I forgot to add the "auto-build" governor, you can activate it by going to the Empire menu, then onto Systems submenu and there clicking on a system of your choice and press 'a' on your keyboard. After that the AI takes over complete planetary management of that colony (including labor unit allocation and so on). I do that later-on in-game when I have smaller colonies I don't want to babysit. You can interact a little with it by adding things manually to the build list, that way the AI decisions are overruled until the build list is finished becomes empty again, then the AI kicks back in automatically.
I also forgot to add user-definability of this governor to the list of version 1.0 roadmap things. Right now it asseses the colony and decides for a strategy itself, without user interaction in that respect.
At the beginning, when there are no "resource allocators/distributors" (a special structure available when reaching certain tech levels, you can look the requirements up at the bote installation folder under \data\buildings\ in the buildings editor provided there), the player is required to babysit his first colonies but in this crucial phase of empire build-up, it's a good thing to do so.
The level of available automation increases as tech develops. At the beginning you are pretty much left with single resource routes (see one of my larger posts at the bottom of page 1 of this thread for some further helpful explanations regarding the use of it; they can be found in the system trade menu and can be laid just like trade routes; they represent what you want with automatic taking resources from a specific type from the colony connected to) but this is wanted since the first 50 turns, focussing on building up your small empire is pretty much everything you do in-game with next-to-no interaction with other players since you just haven't met them.
There is no need at any time however to manually transfer any resources via transport ships or global storage (the one in the system trade menu). Resource routes are nearly always sufficient since titanium is the one and only needed resource at the beginning of the game. They are however not working vice-versa or two-ways, that's probably what you experienced. If you want to have colony X gain auto-access to the storage for a specific resource at colony Y, you need to switch to colony Y and there lay a resource route (if available, check maximum number of routes) to colony X. You can switch through the type of resource by clicking on the button labelled titanium or whatever resource was last used.
Maximum number of routes can be a bit tricky to read, here's an example on how to read the info. Let's assume we just colonized a fresh new world, then we mostly have 4 bn. people living there (with later-on colony ships it increases to 8 respectively 16 bn.). Switching to system trade menu we see that there are 0 trade routes available and 1 resource route. That's the standard. You can always lay one resource route "for free" so to speak. Every additional resource route from that system goes at the cost of one trade route, so if you have a colony with 25 bn. people currently living there, you would normally be able to set 1 trade route and 1 resource route, 2 routes in total. If you don't have trade partners, you can set 2 resource routes but won't be able to set a trade route until you cancelled one of the 2 resource routes. Cancelling trade routes btw. works the same as setting one. You'll notice the line on galaxy map becomes pink, this means the route is going to get cancelled within the next 5 turns.
One exception to the no-manual-transport-need-rule is the deritium resource. It is scarcely available and you will probably get into the situation at some point where you have a colony with large industries but lacking its own deritium deposits. When reaching tech 5, there is a deritium allocator so you won't have any trouble from that on. But before tech level 5, you actually need to build one or two transporters and manually ship around deritium. It has gameplay reasons. For deritium being very precious it should be a somewhat dangerous thing at the beginning to work with and a potentially interesting target for enemy intercepting fleets to target these transporters and do a lot of damage.
On a side note, there's a buildings editor included where you can mod a lot of things, also for example cut out resources and resource costs thus greatly reducing the amount of micromanagement needed for the game. You'll surely get into some game balance issues but nothing a good modder can't handle. Also there's the possibility to increase outputs or just changing required tech levels if you don't want deritium troubles at all in-game.
dragonfk: Microprose's BotF was sadly heavily bugged so it is highly likely it won't run on nowaday machines. There is however an active modding community at www.armadafleetcommand.com/botf with a lot of nice mods.
I also forgot to add user-definability of this governor to the list of version 1.0 roadmap things. Right now it asseses the colony and decides for a strategy itself, without user interaction in that respect.
At the beginning, when there are no "resource allocators/distributors" (a special structure available when reaching certain tech levels, you can look the requirements up at the bote installation folder under \data\buildings\ in the buildings editor provided there), the player is required to babysit his first colonies but in this crucial phase of empire build-up, it's a good thing to do so.
The level of available automation increases as tech develops. At the beginning you are pretty much left with single resource routes (see one of my larger posts at the bottom of page 1 of this thread for some further helpful explanations regarding the use of it; they can be found in the system trade menu and can be laid just like trade routes; they represent what you want with automatic taking resources from a specific type from the colony connected to) but this is wanted since the first 50 turns, focussing on building up your small empire is pretty much everything you do in-game with next-to-no interaction with other players since you just haven't met them.
There is no need at any time however to manually transfer any resources via transport ships or global storage (the one in the system trade menu). Resource routes are nearly always sufficient since titanium is the one and only needed resource at the beginning of the game. They are however not working vice-versa or two-ways, that's probably what you experienced. If you want to have colony X gain auto-access to the storage for a specific resource at colony Y, you need to switch to colony Y and there lay a resource route (if available, check maximum number of routes) to colony X. You can switch through the type of resource by clicking on the button labelled titanium or whatever resource was last used.
Maximum number of routes can be a bit tricky to read, here's an example on how to read the info. Let's assume we just colonized a fresh new world, then we mostly have 4 bn. people living there (with later-on colony ships it increases to 8 respectively 16 bn.). Switching to system trade menu we see that there are 0 trade routes available and 1 resource route. That's the standard. You can always lay one resource route "for free" so to speak. Every additional resource route from that system goes at the cost of one trade route, so if you have a colony with 25 bn. people currently living there, you would normally be able to set 1 trade route and 1 resource route, 2 routes in total. If you don't have trade partners, you can set 2 resource routes but won't be able to set a trade route until you cancelled one of the 2 resource routes. Cancelling trade routes btw. works the same as setting one. You'll notice the line on galaxy map becomes pink, this means the route is going to get cancelled within the next 5 turns.
One exception to the no-manual-transport-need-rule is the deritium resource. It is scarcely available and you will probably get into the situation at some point where you have a colony with large industries but lacking its own deritium deposits. When reaching tech 5, there is a deritium allocator so you won't have any trouble from that on. But before tech level 5, you actually need to build one or two transporters and manually ship around deritium. It has gameplay reasons. For deritium being very precious it should be a somewhat dangerous thing at the beginning to work with and a potentially interesting target for enemy intercepting fleets to target these transporters and do a lot of damage.
On a side note, there's a buildings editor included where you can mod a lot of things, also for example cut out resources and resource costs thus greatly reducing the amount of micromanagement needed for the game. You'll surely get into some game balance issues but nothing a good modder can't handle. Also there's the possibility to increase outputs or just changing required tech levels if you don't want deritium troubles at all in-game.
dragonfk: Microprose's BotF was sadly heavily bugged so it is highly likely it won't run on nowaday machines. There is however an active modding community at www.armadafleetcommand.com/botf with a lot of nice mods.
Raapys
Arcane
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2007
- Messages
- 4,960
Thanks for the detailed explanation and tips. I had created the resource routes, but for some reason I assumed they were connected to the galactic storage and that I needed to transfer the minerals automatically using that screen. I see now that it automatically pulls minerals from the connected planet once I try to build something, just like I had hoped it would, and that the galactic storage is an entirely unrelated system. That should make things easier.
Still trying to find a good balance between expanding my empire, developing my colonies, building defenses and mining/production/research. So far I've always got stuck in the 'must build everything on my colonies' mentality and whenever I've completed what I wanted, research has unlocked something new. Thus I get caught with my pants down when suddenly another empire appears with a full fleet and I haven't even gotten around to building a single warship yet.
Still trying to find a good balance between expanding my empire, developing my colonies, building defenses and mining/production/research. So far I've always got stuck in the 'must build everything on my colonies' mentality and whenever I've completed what I wanted, research has unlocked something new. Thus I get caught with my pants down when suddenly another empire appears with a full fleet and I haven't even gotten around to building a single warship yet.
Malvoisin
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2008
- Messages
- 20
yes I know that, exactly what's happened to me too at the beginning . But now being a veteran player I know when to break out of the upgrade circle and simply use what I already got for fleet production and intel sabotage attempts (there's nothing more satisfying than having the enemy produce ships for you.. but I recommend this tactic only for the Rotharian Star Empire at the beginning, the other majors are too weak respectively lack a specific special structure to carry out such attempts successfully at early turns). It's not that easy to get that balance and there's also no "right way to do it" but one hint that always works is to watch out for space-faring minors and focussing on getting them into your empire rather quickly (not too quickly but when they build a few ships on their own). After they join you, their fleet comes with them and this kinda "inverts" the formerly poor military status quite fast..
btw. planetary defenses like 1 or 2 mine fields on borderline colonies are mostly enough at the first 50-100 turns depending on difficulty level you are playing, see options for changing it. On BABY you fight against an AI with no cheats except some minor deritium deliveries and the knowledge of good(=large) planet systems on the map. The other levels have the effect that the AI gets bonii on resources and build times (for example on IMPOSSIBLE build times are cut to 1/10). The AI always works the same on those levels, it just has a stronger/weaker output to work with.
. But now being a veteran player I know when to break out of the upgrade circle and simply use what I already got for fleet production and intel sabotage attempts (there's nothing more satisfying than having the enemy produce ships for you.. but I recommend this tactic only for the Rotharian Star Empire at the beginning, the other majors are too weak respectively lack a specific special structure to carry out such attempts successfully at early turns). It's not that easy to get that balance and there's also no "right way to do it" but one hint that always works is to watch out for space-faring minors and focussing on getting them into your empire rather quickly (not too quickly but when they build a few ships on their own). After they join you, their fleet comes with them and this kinda "inverts" the formerly poor military status quite fast..btw. planetary defenses like 1 or 2 mine fields on borderline colonies are mostly enough at the first 50-100 turns depending on difficulty level you are playing, see options for changing it. On BABY you fight against an AI with no cheats except some minor deritium deliveries and the knowledge of good(=large) planet systems on the map. The other levels have the effect that the AI gets bonii on resources and build times (for example on IMPOSSIBLE build times are cut to 1/10). The AI always works the same on those levels, it just has a stronger/weaker output to work with.
Anybody know where you can download this now? All the download links lead to a Joomla web installer page which blocks access to the files.
Edit: nvm...can get it from the German forum http://www.forum.birth-of-the-empir...2&t=1673&sid=6828a2bc0f246a0e3c6f74981bb80209
Edit: nvm...can get it from the German forum http://www.forum.birth-of-the-empir...2&t=1673&sid=6828a2bc0f246a0e3c6f74981bb80209
at what stage they are now??
Trash
Pointing and laughing.
Seems it's been dead in the water since 2011.
Malv0isin
Barely Literate
- Joined
- Sep 29, 2014
- Messages
- 1
Sorry for the late post but the good news are, the game is still under development. Currently we reached 0.9 version which can be downloaded here: http://www.heise.de/download/birth-of-the-empires.html .
Despite the download page being german the game is in english. We do not have an english download mirror right now after the old one is gone.
Major improvements over the last version are:
- startscreen
- Alien entities
- random events
- all six races playable
- different galaxy sizes and options like minor race density, star density etc.
- new troop types
Already implemented in our latest beta test version is a system governor which reduces the amount of micromanagement while allocating your labor units greatly. For those who know how to use a compiler, everything's here on github: https://github.com/bote-team/bote
Despite the download page being german the game is in english. We do not have an english download mirror right now after the old one is gone.
Major improvements over the last version are:
- startscreen
- Alien entities
- random events
- all six races playable
- different galaxy sizes and options like minor race density, star density etc.
- new troop types
Already implemented in our latest beta test version is a system governor which reduces the amount of micromanagement while allocating your labor units greatly. For those who know how to use a compiler, everything's here on github: https://github.com/bote-team/bote
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