there we go again.

Es war einmal - Once upon a time

The classic beginning for one of the most known collection of fairytales of the world.

The better known (Disney) version is rather unsuitable for FFH2, but the original versions should fit much better - I've heard.
Unlike Disney, the Brothers Grimm had adults as their target audience.


To the game:
FFH2 in the incarnation of the EitB Submod.
It's surprising difficult to find all setting.
I think this is more or less a copy of the last game ?

Six players:
Aurorarcher
Bing
coldrain
Ginger
mackoti
xist10

A bigger map as the last map and a similiar accelerated start.


I don't expect much from this game - I have no significant FFH2 experience and I think, I can't really transport my (small) BtS experience to this mod. And maybe I play to many games.

I think, this report will be more or less a mirror of my german report on civforum.de - Storythread at CF
Uploading screenshots is still not working reliably here, I think.

Just posting a thread for now so RefSteel can give map and civs whenever he’s ready

Just finished up a fun game with Darloks on Impossible. It was a classic case of being able to come from behind with them. Overall, Darloks are certainly my favorite race to play, even though Klackons are stronger. I had to go back to old saves to get pics, and I didn't have saves for all the best times, so there are some gaps. This was Impossible Medium map. 

Started out with a decent map and some challenging opponents:
   

The close green star on the lower right ended up being Ultra Poor, but I went ahead anyway. 

For quite a while I only had contact with the Silicoids and Mrrshan. I was planning to go against the Silis but then the Klackons got involved and I decided to go after them instead, as they were a softer target. I had been able to acquire a good selection planets early on by setting the forward planets ASAP and then filling in my back field, which you'll see in the next map. I started spying almost right way, but made sure to start trade agreements on the first turn of meeting and also gave some minor tribute.

I met the Psilons around 2447:

   

   

I was worried when I saw them, as they looked to be a good bit ahead and with a sizable population. I got spies in ASAP to see what they had. 

   

   

Looked like they were pretty well ahead. I was contemplating just throwing in the towel, but since I was Darloks I went ahead. 

   

Here's what the map looked like by this point: 
   

So far everything had been peaceful. A few rebuffed skirmishes. The Psilons actually attacked a planet of mine, but I was barely able to drive them away with Planetary Shields and Scatter Packs and then they just left me alone for a bit. 

So I launched an attack on the Klackons as of this turn, but I didn't have much to work with:
   

I attacked the closest green star right below the red one near my home world in the map above.

This is how my research was set:
   

It mostly stayed about that like through most of the game, a few changes here and there. 

You can see why I didn't go after the Silis:
   

So this was how things looked at the mid-game. I had some decent planets, but was pretty far behind the Psilons in tech, especially in computers, which had me worried. But I was able to get good relations with them long enough while I started taking over the Klackons.

Ready to play!

Second attempt at PBEM game. Fun times ahead!

Wellllll here goes! Last time, I was afraid of making the map too large and apparently underestimated the amount of space that people expect for a game of FfH, so I'm glad it turned out to be fun anyway! This time ... I'm probably getting more than a little over-ambitious with these starts, to say nothing of other map concepts. You tell me....

[EDIT: All starts superseded, most with substantial changes! See below!]

I am creating a thread for thoughts on Remnants of the Precursors, as I play though my initial game. It seemed more polite than continuing to clutter up Dp101's thread with things not related to the showcase game Dp101 is very kindly reporting on. I have not been taking screenshots of my game, so this will not be a game report but just a collection of random thoughts as I encounter things. I may include some screenshots to illustrate specific points.

I am playing as the lizards, the Ssslauren in RotP naming. I drew a start at the far southwest edge of the galaxy, pretty isolated. I had two stars within range -- I love the easy visibility of what is in range (both regular and with reserve tanks), plus the ability to turn on distance markers on the map centered on any selected world. No more guessing if a system is going to be within range or not. Unfortunately both were parallel along the rim of the galaxy, rather than towards the center and more stars. I was clearly going to need more range tech early in this game.

Both were red stars, so it was a coin flip. I sent my colony ship south and sent my scouts north and east. I found a desert 35 for my second world -- not great. The other star was a poor minimal 50, though, so at least I got the better of the two. The usual factory building followed after I sent some pop, with plans for another col ship once the build time at Sssla was 6 turns or so.

Scouting revealed a large terran planet beyond the poor world, so maybe I did not get the better option for my second world. Oh well. I will just have to build another col ship immediately. The star to my east (towards the center of the galaxy) had a toxic world, so I would not be getting to the denser areas of the galaxy any time soon. At least I should not have to worry about neighbors for some time.

Pretty typical development of the second world and maxing of the homeworld followed, and I got the poor world and the very nice terran settled. A trickle of science was started to open fields, and I did not have range 4; this would slow me down. Some poor options elsewhere also hurt; no clean up, no terrforming. Oh well, I'll just have to deal. I did have controlled barren and there was a barren 50 that would be reachable.

The game lets you display the turn on the main map, either as turn number or year number. For some reason the year number is not based from 2300 like MOO, but is 978? No idea what is going on with that. Turn number works well enough, but it would be nice to be able to have the years based from 2300. At turn 50 I get a diplomatic intro screen for the bugs, the Kholdan Hive. (I like the naming of the races in the game, different for legal reasons but obvious who they are.) Weirdly, there is no sign of the bugs anywhere, and the races screen reports they are out of range and cannot be contacted or spied upon. So why was I notified of their existence? Maybe one of their ships passed within range of one of my scouts and then went back out of range? I am a bit confused by this. Unlike MOO, you can not tell who else is in the galaxy from the start. So this semi-contact is useful information. I just am not sure why it happened. Maybe the bugs have longer range tech than I do?

Anyway, the bugs are their usual xenophobic selves so I am sure they will be trouble in the future. The diplo system helpfully tells me (Civ4 style) that I have a very large negative modifier with them for first contact. Being hated just for existing is always such fun.

Hey RB, I'd like to propose a new pitboss, with a premade map based of a Medium&Small or archipelago script.
Navy Navy Navy
There are several active pitbosses so I don't expect this to take off immediately, maybe in late May or early June

Settings:
Monarch or Emperor
No barbs
No Events/Spies/TechTrading etc.

Mapmaker Guidance:
Room for ~13-15 decent cities per player with an even landgrab
Everyone can establish contact and trade pre astro
Some astro exclusive land, maybe 5-10% of total land tiles and resources? 

Bans:
FIN, ORG, Vikings, GLH, Colossus

Org could possibly be unbanned if the difficulty is lower, but it just feels like too much with the LH bonus. 
About civ bans maybe the Dutch, Portuguese and Chinese deserve attention, but they don't seem oppressive like Vikings and maybe deserve some time in the sun. Also their bonuses take longer to bloom

Prompted by RefSteel in the thread for the game, this is a report of a run with the intention of showcasing the game and its various improvements/changes over the original MoO. I'll be writing assuming knowledge of the original game, hopefully I won't wind up skimming over new changes in the process.

Anyways, as suggested I went with the following settings: We'll be playing as the Psilons Mentarans, a race with an entirely unique and legally distinct pair of bonuses for 75% of techs showing up in their trees and +50% research. Average map size for 6 opponents and 100 stars, "harder" (6 out of 7) difficulty (usually I play 1 below, but I also don't usually play the strongest race in the game), and "base" AI, which is still significantly smarter than the original's AI, but not as absurd as Modnar (flavourful + strong) or Xilmi (pure strength, AI flavour left by the wayside) can be. For the layout, Ellipse was picked, which comes with 2 suboptions, one that ranges from Circular to Eclipse 4 that determines how flattened vs round the map is, and Void, ranging from no void to 4, which controls the size of a, well, void in the centre of the galaxy, which helps to shape the map a bit more and make it feel less like a regular one with the corners shaved off. I went went with the default of Eclipse 2, and set void from the default none to 1, to try to get more of a shape going on without making it just a loop, but via fiddling with settings you can indeed get a pure ring to play on if you'd like: