Space Combat Redefined: Galactic Armory 1.6 news

Space Combat Redefined

What does this mean? While combat in Star Ruler is generally a very fun thing, we felt that the differences between different weapon types and technologies were too superficial. This especially held true with the plethora of subsystems added by Galactic Armory.

So, to remedy this situation, we decided to make each and every weapon system much more distinct than before. Basically, most weapons, while being powerful, suffer from some degree of efficiency degradation over long range. Here's a short explanation of the basics:

• Ballistic weapons, such as Railguns and Autocannons, always deal full damage per hit. Shots at targets past their effective range have a chance to miss, however.
• Beam Energy Weapons, such as Lasers and Ion Beams, always hit (except for fighters and stealth ships). Their damage output decreases due to dispersion past their effective range, though.
• Energy Projectile Weapons like Particle Cannons and Plasma Throwers suffer from both dispersion and inaccuracy over long range. They do not use ammunition and are still quite powerful to compensate for this.
• Missile-type weapons have extreme range and high damage output. This makes them deadly first-strike weapons. However, point defense provided by several subsystems can intercept up to 80% of incoming missiles and torpedos.

Since one picture speaks more than a thousand words, we figured that a thousand pictures would be even better:

In addition to offering more complexity, we also strive to make the game more accessible by helping veterans and new players alike. While the old manual won't be updated anymore, most of its content is available through the in-game Stellarpedia now. No more outdated governor information! As an added bonus, we also included a ship blueprint design guide to help newbies learn the basics of ship design.

If you're still reading this instead of playing the mod already, you might also be interested in the changelog:

Changelog:

• Changed: Shields stop regenerating and drawing power when charge < 10%
• Added: New AI Personality "Inhibitor"
• Changed: Major overhaul of all AI personalities and ship designs; AIs now have individual traits
• Changed: Mass decrease for Ship Hulls, Armor and some Defenses. 2% per average level of Chemistry, Metallurgy and Ship Construction; formula is:
  (base formula) * max((1 - (0.02 * (floor((Techs.Metallurgy.Level / 3) + (Techs.ShipConstruction.Level / 3) + (Techs.Chemistry.Level / 3))))), 0.2)
• Changed: Mass decrease for all other subsystems. 1% per average level of Chemistry, Metallurgy and Ship Construction; formula is:
  (base formula) * max((1 - (0.01 * (floor((Techs.Metallurgy.Level / 3) + (Techs.ShipConstruction.Level / 3) + (Techs.Chemistry.Level / 3))))), 0.6)
• Changed: Size-to-delay modifier has been changed. Formula is now [basedelay] * min((1 + (sqrt(Object.Scale) / 50)), 3)
• Changed: Scale-to-range and level-to-range modifiers have been changed. New formula is: (([base damage] * (1 + (Level * (0.01 * WEAP_RANGE_CURVE)))) + (2 * sqrt(Object.Scale))) * WEAP_RANGE_MULT
  This means that the base range modifier is +5% per level. Additionally, (sqrt(Object.Scale) * 2) is added, making large designs at low-tech have very high weapon range.
• Fixed: The Quantum Battery formula was broken, actually decreasing vCharge with increasing tech level.
• Added: Twin Turret versions of Railgun, Heavy Railgun, Particle Cannon, Plasma Thrower
• Added: New Trait: Computer-dependent Society - Start with Computers unlocked (Level 1); Bridge, ICC, Cockpit and Crew Quarters stay locked
• Added: Mothership hull. Minimum scale 3600, provides 40% ship bay, 18 space, less shield emitters and armor points than the Gargantuan Hull.
• Fixed: When Trait "Bustling Homeworld" was used with Realistic Systems Generation, homeworld space would end up with 35 instead of 40 slots.
• Added: New Governors. "Orbital Shipyard Worlds" consist of 1 shipyard, 1 cargo block per 10 slots and many starports to supply orbital drydock building; New governors for pure Luxuries or Goods production were also added.
• Changed: Fuel Cells provide only half their normal capacity at scale 1 and below
• Changed: Ramscoop, Bussard Ramjet, AM Generator and Shielded AM Generator now have a minimum size of Scale * Size = 1
• Fixed: AI was unable to expand properly due to the introduction of the new economy
• Balance: Most weapons have been completely rebalanced to make them fill a specific niche
• Added: Point Defense abilty to Flak, Firestorm and other weapons as well as a dedicated Point Defense system. Maximum PD efficiency per ship is capped at 80%.
• Balance: Introduced new Stealth hull dodge formula
• Balance: Reduced ship bay of Carrier Hull from 80% to 60% of it's own scale
• Fixed: Stellarpedia entry about planetary governors was showing vanilla governors
• Fixed: Stellarpedia subsystem categories were still using vanilla categories
• Balance: Increased Heliocide Hull space from 8 to 9
• Changed: Most Hull Types now provide extra space above specific levels of scale, i.e. for every 100 units of scale (up to +3 space)
• Added: 9 new loading backgrounds
• Added: Stellarpedia entry about ship blueprint design
• Added: New options at game start (economy and trade multipliers, etc.)
• Balance: Nerfed Shield Armor as it was severely overpowered
• Fixed: Several long-standing small bugs in some of the data files

Download links for Galactic Armory 1.6

ModDB: Download
Mod site @BMS: Download
Mediafire: Download