On Very Easy I Die in Tutorial?!

[LarryP]

This is a copied post I posted in the Steam forum. I hope that's OK.

First off let me state that this game is beautiful. The menus work flawless, the sounds, visuals, tool-tips, everything works excellent. I have not even found any typos yet and that's very unusual. It even has a 52 page PDF manual that is done excellent which seems to be a fading commodity now a days.

I chose Humans on Very Easy, all other settings on default:

However, during the tutorial I lost planet earth while I was building ships to go to Pluto, like I was told in the tutorial. I was to build some ships to go to Pluto and when I got there the tutorial would kick back in then. While I was building this one big ship (Cruiser-4) instead of a few smaller ones, my planet earth gets bombarded by the Tantiks and I barely won. So I sped up construction and bought the rest of my ship to not wait any longer, and when I launched it towards Pluto, I got bombarded by the Tantiks again and they destroyed my Cruiser-4 and planet earth! I'm dead now except for the measly planet Pluto I own. Where did they get so many ships as they had a bunch?!

Tutorial over!

I'm not saying anything bad about the game, because it functions so well in every way, but I hope it also functions well in the balance of races, especially with the 5 or 6 levels to choose from, mine being Very Easy. I hope this was my fault.

I really hope this is my fault as I have been watching for all space 4x games since MOO1. I own most all of them and probably some most young players have not heard of. This is my favorite genre of game and this one has great potential.

Anyways, enough sniveling. Anyone else have this happen?

[FrozenFallout]

odd what turn did they start attacking you. Wonder if you got a bad seed where they started out next to you. The Tantiks are one of the most aggressive races think of them like the borg, so if you started out next to them I could see them wiping you out quick.

[LarryP]

I'm at my iPad so I can't check what turn I was on for sure, but I guess it would be about turn 30. I wasn't in the game that long as far as turn numbers go. I did a lot of checking things out as it's a beautiful game with good information everywhere.

[FrozenFallout]

Thats interesting prior builds in Beta you could go 100s of turns with out having your homeworld attacked. New AI upgrade must have really upped the aggression. I haven't had much time to spend with the new build but my guess is a bad seed as in the few games I have played I haven't had trouble with being attacked in the first 100 turns or so.

[LarryP]

Wow. I was a long ways from 100 turns. I could be off on the 30 estimate and I will check my PC in the morning. Even if I was at 50 that's still a ways from 100.

[FrozenFallout]

Yeah start another game Im sure you will get more then 50 turns of peace. My best guess is they started very close to you and that shouldn't happen very often. Other races will attack but they take a bit longer before going in to smash you.

[LarryP]

OK, I will do that today and see what happens. Thank you.

[FrozenFallout]

So on my 4th or so game I got to see what you where talking about. I had the Tantiks right next door. By turn 30 we where at war and by turn 50 or so they took 2 of my worlds from me and Im holding out on Earth now. I lost one world when I shouldn't have though as I just didn't pay attention and could have built a star base which would have been good enough defense. Im putting the game on hold for right now and might go back to it.

Thing was I was able to make friends with the Har'k and the Kor and have both of them turning on the Tantiks for me. The Har'k also have a world between me and the Tantiks which might help buffer.

I see what you are saying though even with a good understanding of the game if you start next to the Tantiks you not going to have an easy start thats for sure and if you not sure what your doing its game over.

[LarryP]

Sorry to hear it's the game and not me. I haven't had time yet to go back into it but I will soon. I tried to make peace with the Tantiks but that was a waste of time. Also I did not have contact with any other race to ally with. Like I said, I was just following the tutorial and did not do much more than what it told me to do. I made a few adjustments to my economy but not military. Now I know to play more aggressive even through the tutorial.

I will let you know how it goes this next time.

Thanks!

[FrozenFallout]

Yeah I noticed on my Tutorial game when I tested it I was way behind compaired to when I just do what I think is best. Im sessioned in the game to a degree having been playing since alpha release but found that the Tutorial really slowes you down buts a great thing to go through first time (if your don't get a bad seed that is) my tutorial game I finished the Tutorial around turn 70 or so and hadn't had any trouble from anyone.

My suggestion is after you get the hang of the game don't start with the tutorial as it will set you back. My first turn with out Tutorial on is normally fast build a Assualt ship to attack the probe fast build industry and build tourism and trade which puts me to around 0 money at the end of turn but starts me out nice. By turn 3 I have a scout out checking things out, a colony ship on the way in 14 or so turns and all the tech from the probe. I also destory all colony ships after used and also get rid of the Assualt ship (med size ship) as soon as I finish boarding the probe, so that I don't have to pay its horrible maintenance and instead push out scouts and colony ships for the first 100 turns or so.

[LarryP]

Got it. In the Steam forums where I posted this same thread, one guy said to build a starbase the first turn. Is that a good idea?

[FrozenFallout]

Got it. In the Steam forums where I posted this same thread, one guy said to build a starbase the first turn. Is that a good idea?

If you need defenses a Starbase is the way to go. If not its a drain of 200 mc a turn so don't do it until you have a good econ as 10 turns will cost you 2 billion cred and you could use that at the start. Also don't fast build a starbase if you can help it. Mid game they are very very useful with refits and defense and reloading colony ships. Early game they are the best defense. Make sure to mod them and fill them with fighters and Heavy weapons and light weapons.

[LarryP]

Got it again. Thank you for all your help, I really appreciate your time.

One stupid question... I went into the game and I cannot find where the turn counts are shown?! I looked everywhere. Where are they shown?

[True_poser]

Got it. In the Steam forums where I posted this same thread, one guy said to build a starbase the first turn. Is that a good idea?

Nope.
Buying a starbase costs 40bc which you don't have.
Building a starbase will take ages, you need to develop industry first.
Bottom line - you'll just waste 10bc.

Starbase is ok for carpet colonizing - after colonizing some other planet in the system the colonizer automatically refits and is ready to colonise again, but not on early stages.

[LarryP]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/236130/di ... 653719256/
The post number 5 including mine is where he states a star base first turn in the first paragraph. The cost is 10bc at 32 turns. Ouch!

What do you mean "colonizer?"

Also, other than figuring from the year 2151, are the turns count indicated somewhere because I sure don't see them?

[FrozenFallout]

In Horizon unless you have the option of destroy colony ship selected you keep you colony ship but use up a colony pod every time you colonize. In the start of the game this is almost useless as you need a star base to refit the colony pod on the colony ship using a star base and colony ships have a high maintenance per turn to where its not useful to keep them around.

So for the start of game for about the first 100 turns or so I will destroy all colony ships I use after I create a colony. However mid game once you have a star base and near by planets you want to colonize you can refit the colony ship at the star base and it can be used again. This is great for mass colonizing a system or two near by. Still you should take into consideration how much time your colony ship will be in space as it does cost a good amount of credits per turn depending on your tech level.

For finding your turn you need to do math. I am not aware of any way to see what turn it is with out doing the math, although I wonder if its possible for them to make the year clickable so you can switch between years and turns like I have seen in other 4x games.

[LarryP]

Makes perfect sense. I saw the option to destroy colony ships after they are used. And I didn't know the star base would refit them once used. Good information. Thanks again.

I think it would be nice to have the turns indicated on the turn advance button.

I'm doing the tutorial again but I removed all the aggressive races. That should let me finish.

[FrozenFallout]

Well thanks to your little tuffle with the borg race looks like tutorial has been fixed so the AI wont mess with you for the first 75 turns or so.

Not 100% sure it was from this topic but from now on all the newbies don't need to worry about getting rushed in the first 75 turns.

[LarryP]

Good! However, I ran into another problem my 2nd play through the tutorial. This one just as bad. The tutorial just stopped giving me help on what to do. Just gave up the ghost so to speak. It also happened around thirty turns in. So now I'm still not getting the tutorial done. I wonder if it has to do with eliminating the aggressive races...

[FrozenFallout]

What was the last thing the Tutorial wanted you to do?

I noticed on my play through of the new and improved Tutorial that there where a few areas of it that I needed to poke around a bit and do everything they wanted me to do. It could be your just missing one small step like engaging the sector or build this type of ship. I cant remember where it was but even with exp I got lost on one section of the Tutorial and took me a few turns to find out how to get back on track.