Just another RTS?

I have read what this site has to say and what a number of game site previews have to say and I must admit I am still skeptical and a little puzzled. I have played the demos of DoW and other RTSs and have completed a few RTSs (WC3) and they just seem like (for the most part) twitch group panic gameplay. You never get to enjoy the time you have invested in your creation and such. You're just jumping around the map pumping out as much as you can as fast as you can. I am tried of that.

While this game states that it is different I can't help but notice all the screenshots on this site and the previews all seem to be combat even though it bills itself as a kind of 4X lite. It looks like Homeworld to me and that was a jump around RTS to me and the demo got unintalled pretty fast. I really liked its look and premise though which is one of the main reasons I came here to take a closer look at this game.

The only hestitation for dismissing the game as just another RTS is the fact that Stardock is involved.

The information says you don't have to micromanage your fleet if you don't want to but with so many ships (it seems) how could you not? How could you just let them fight? Is it then a numbers game then? I just don't get it.

I like the premise of the game. No turns and what not. But is the combat just craziness where I will be wishing I had a pause button?

I am relative new to the game obviously and only became interested or even knew it was out there was through a front page article on the GameSpy site. So sorry if my questions have been covered a number of times already.

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Fomar Thain

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well, considering a 1v1 on a really small map takes an hour, it really isnt all that twitchy, as a matter of fact, it isnt very twitchy at all

How could you just let them fight?

AI, also the timing is quite slow compared to war3 and whatnot so you can sit back and enjoy the battles

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Not very twitchy at all, you get a lot of time to ponder your thoughts.

It really is worth trying, it is a very impressive engine even though it is only in beta.

It is a fairly decent balance between RTS and Turn Based. Certainly nothing like any traditional RTS.

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Gauntlet03

Join Date 01/2004

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The AI is currently incapable of managing a battle by itself, so you do have to manage it, though it is not twitchy with the pacing as it is. Some people want to speed it up in which case it will be like those other RTS. Though I must say I have played all the games you mentioned extensively and it is much much more in depth then jumping around the map and clicking... that fits FPS better IMO.

That being said, the AI is not currently a priority it will get better and then we won't need to micromanage the battles so much.

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I dont know what your talking about, sure there is a lot management, but it rarely deals with fleets.

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No, it's far from being "just another RTS", and hopefully the devs won't be pulled too far in that direction by those who would like it to be. That said, it does need a little speeding up at present (that from someone very much at the '4X' end of the spectrum) particularly in multiplay. The devs are on the case.

As to screenshots, I think there are a lot of those featuring battles as they are just the prettiest kind. Not too much exciting about seeing a star-map or factory/asteroid and although the stars and planets are pretty they don't exactly 'do' much in persuading you to part with your cash!

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It also isn't just about numbers and getting them to a specific location as quickly as possible. You can beef up your research tree giving your ships more power, take strategic planets to gain a trade advantage, choose to go defense heavy or offense heavy (either way has it's pros/cons), or a host of other strategic options. It's very much strategic game and it's not all fighting, there is so much more to the game.

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The information says you don't have to micromanage your fleet if you don't want to but with so many ships (it seems) how could you not? How could you just let them fight? Is it then a numbers game then? I just don't get it.

Basicly while you can still stick your hand in on the tactical end of things, there is a "tactical AI" that can handle a lot of the things a player would normally have to do manually, like triggering and targeting powers, chasing down targets, etc etc. Please note that this is pretty well restricted to individual grav wells (planets), so your ships don't just do everything themselves, they just fight themselves fairly effectively.

And a human player who knows what he's doing can still help the AI out -- in its current state, in fact, quite a bit!

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