That has involved a LOT of changes, virtually every hull design has had its production cost changed, many have also had various other stats tweaked, the Robotic line (including the Constructed hulls built sith the Geo Integration facility) had their costs reduced significantly and the Constructed hulls have also been given Core Slots. On the other hand, the Organic line of hulls have mostly had their costs increased, in some cases significantly, and the Organic Growth feature has been tweaked repeatedly as well.
In the test games I've run over this time, I think it's now a lot closer to "right" and how fast I "win" with each research line as my main focus is now roughly on a par, with the exception of the Energy line of hulls which, despite both increased cost and reduced structure are still incredibly powerful if you can manage to build them.
So, we need feedback:
- When playing through, do you think any particular hull is too fast? Too slow? Too weak? Too powerful?
- Is the build time compared to cost effectiveness of a particular design at the right level?
- When planning your strategy for conquest, do you find yourself deciding on a particular hull line as a main focus for reasons you don't think make for a fun game/choice? (eg if you always end up building Robotic-line hulls because they're easier and the AI always build drydocks, and not because you want to go down that research line this game, that may be an issue, if you avoid Organic line hulls because the build time to use them with newly conquered natives is too much compared to other lines, etc).
- Each hull line is meant to have their strengths and weaknesses, these, I hope, should be fairly obvious now within the game, but is a particular line especially strong or especially weak due to those factors?
- Over multiple games, if you switch hull lines and concentrate on a different type, do you find that, with similar galaxy setups, your victory is roughly at the same time? Is one hull particularly slow for victory, or particularly fast?
Specific parts concerns:
The costs for the speed-increasing engine parts have been decreased substantially. The Trans Spatial Drive core part has been introduced, these, currently, stack, meaning certain hull types can be incredibly fast. Given that we, as players, regularly order multi-system long moves, whereas the AI tends to (but doesn't always) move from specific system to specific system, the massive speed increase gives us another advantage, is it too big an advantage? I'm fairly sure the TS-Drive is overpowered but at the same time it's a really nice part and I don't want to tone down its in game power too much. Would it be best balanced by an increase in build time, an increase in cost, both?
Please note, in planning for 0.4.5, nothing is off the table in terms of balance, if you think there's a problem, something is too weak or too strong compared to other choices, please do say so. That then gives other players the chance to also try your combination and discuss it. Some changes are inevitable and almost certainly necessary. Other problems might be best sovled by tweaking somethign else entirely, or aren't considered overall too much of a problem.
But we all need to be aware if they potentially exist.