Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

For those who might wonder what GalCiv3 is bringing to the table over GalCiv2, I found this handy chart on their site:

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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

Daehawk wrote: Wed Apr 11, 2018 8:38 pm Fallout 4 is only $14.99 right now. Pretty cheap.
That is tempting; I've been watching for a Steam sale. But I just paid $18 for the GalCiv DLC, so my gaming budget is shot for awhile now.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

Initial impressions: Game balance has changed noticeably. Extreme planets are not as common as advertised, at least not in the 1/5 of the galaxy that I've explored so far...haven't found any yet. The government mechanic is going to take some getting used to, and will change my usual research routine. I need to read up on commonwealths, because money and happiness are both more problematic than they used to be.

IDK how much of the changes I'm seeing come from 3.0 and how much is from the expansion, but I feel like the game is different enough that I'm gonna get my 18 bucks worth.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by tgb »

Kraken wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 1:52 am I feel like the game is different enough that I'm gonna get my 18 bucks worth.
Can you elaborate a bit more. I wouldn't mind getting this if I could justify it.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

tgb wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 7:05 am
Kraken wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 1:52 am I feel like the game is different enough that I'm gonna get my 18 bucks worth.
Can you elaborate a bit more. I wouldn't mind getting this if I could justify it.
Well, I'm only a few hours in so far. But in this first game at least, resources are more precious (I think ship costs and starbase upgrades use more materials) and money is tighter. Getting trade routes early is more important. The tax slider is tempting, but that raises unhappiness without dramatically increasing your income while your tax base is small. Morale is becoming a problem already. Planets come with food resources, so you can build cities (and breed taxpayers) right from the get-go, but of course bigger populations are harder to keep happy. The only governments available at the start limit you to four colonies before penalties kick in, motivating one to research techs leading to better governments -- previously a lower-priority branch of the tree. Punishing overexpansion tones down the usual land rush (the AI doesn't seem to expand as rapidly, either). In fact, it seems like there's more pressure to spam out starbases than colonies initially. There's also an option to form commonwealths, which I am guessing are semi-independent colonies that don't count against your limits...but I need to read up on that.

As I said, I'm not very far into it, but the opening game feels quite different.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by tgb »

Thanks, although other then the Commonwealth stuff it still sounds like the political/economic system from GalCiv II with a couple of tweaks.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

So I'm playing with the new Intrigue DLC and so far I'm enjoying myself. I did finally realize that maybe I was trying to drink from a fire hose by having the galaxy conditions set to common planets and resources and too many extra civs, so I set most everything to occasional except for things like mega events which were set to rare. So now I'm able to enjoy things a bit more.

I did find something that seems like a bit of an exploit. I formed my first Commonwealth since my planet limit was four and I had just colonized my fifth planet. So I created The New Terrans, which btw is like creating a new civ, including descriptions and logos, and now I've got a new neighbor. And that new neighbor has a starting treasury of 3000. So I went to my new neighbor with a shiny bit of rock (Helios Ore) and traded it to them for 950 credits. I sort of felt like I just bought Manhattan or something :roll:.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

I doubt that anyone can answer this, but here goes:

I created a custom civilization and played it once -- it was shown "Hot Loading" during game setup. It does not appear in the races list or the opponents, yet it appears as an AI race in almost every game. I would like to delete it, or at least exclude it. But because it doesn't show up in the startup screens, I don't know how.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Sepiche »

Kraken wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 2:12 pm I doubt that anyone can answer this, but here goes:

I created a custom civilization and played it once -- it was shown "Hot Loading" during game setup. It does not appear in the races list or the opponents, yet it appears as an AI race in almost every game. I would like to delete it, or at least exclude it. But because it doesn't show up in the startup screens, I don't know how.
Not sure why it wouldn't be showing, but you can try looking for it's file here and just removing it:
C:\Your User Name\Documents\My Games\GalCiv3\Factions
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

So, further into my new Intrigue game and I'm seeing some weird stuff, not necessarily bugs, but weird. So I had spawned off a commonwealth ally called The New Terrans as I reported above. And some number of turns later the Drengin declare war on them, I guess seeing them as easy meat. I sold them some old four stack destroyers for some nice credits and wished them well. After a while, I saw a Drengin fleet near a solar system not too far from old Sol itself. I moved my fleet out towards the Drengins who left; it turns out that someone had declared war on them.

Meantime an event had triggered saying a space monster was headed for my territory. I decided that instead of going all Captain Kirk on its ass, I'd be Captain Picard and try to make friends. I awaited a call back. Meantime The New Terrans had sent a colony ship to near one of my colonies. And stopped there. I thought that was odd, but whatever, those kids are always full of new ideas.

A few turns later, turns out I should have gone with Captain Kirk, or even better Commodore Decker. The creature didn't eat Sheboygan but it did destroy Hodgkins 538I, turning it from a nice class 8 planet to a barren class 4 one. And guess who's colony ship plopped down there two turns later? Yup, somehow The New Terrans deduced that Hodgkins 538I was suddenly going to be available. I wonder... :?

However, as much as I am suspicious of The New Terrans, they would have made P.T. Barnum happy. I can sell them most anything and they are happy to ship me the credits. I'm just hoping it won't cost me another colony :ninja:
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

Sepiche wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 2:32 pm
Kraken wrote: Thu Apr 12, 2018 2:12 pm I doubt that anyone can answer this, but here goes:

I created a custom civilization and played it once -- it was shown "Hot Loading" during game setup. It does not appear in the races list or the opponents, yet it appears as an AI race in almost every game. I would like to delete it, or at least exclude it. But because it doesn't show up in the startup screens, I don't know how.
Not sure why it wouldn't be showing, but you can try looking for it's file here and just removing it:
C:\Your User Name\Documents\My Games\GalCiv3\Factions
It only had one of the three files that all other races have, so that's probably why. I threw it together quickly and didn't customize its graphics or text, figuring I'd flesh it out later if I liked it.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Oh, I forgot to mention about Commonwealths. While I'm not getting anything significant from The New Terrans in my budget, every once in a while they gift me 175 bc because they like me. Between this and the money I'm still taking in from my survey ships I might be showing a -25 budget deficit on the Economy page but my cash surplus has been staying nicely positive.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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Watching Das Tactic's video has almost convinced me to get this, particularly since I have a little bit in my Steam wallet burning a hole. I'll probably end up grabbing it tomorrow if nothing better comes along.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by tgb »

I just reinstalled with the intention of probably grabbing Intrigue, but none of the races I had previously gotten from the Workshop show up when starting a game.

I've seen on Steam that a couple of other people are running into the same snafu.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Hmm, I'm several hours into a new game using Intrigue and my previously selected Civilizations are there. But of course they were there before I installed Intrigue, so maybe that's the different.

OK, I'm confused. How do I build legions in the game? Not garrisons, just legions to put on transports. I tried the wiki but I didn't see anything that helped.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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Apparently I had to access the Workshop from the race selection screen before they would appear. Must be something added into 3.0
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Fitzy »

jztemple2 wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 3:34 am Hmm, I'm several hours into a new game using Intrigue and my previously selected Civilizations are there. But of course they were there before I installed Intrigue, so maybe that's the different.

OK, I'm confused. How do I build legions in the game? Not garrisons, just legions to put on transports. I tried the wiki but I didn't see anything that helped.
As I recall there’s a building that will allow construction of legions on the planet you build it. Also generals come with a few. Assuming this hasn’t been changed.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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Fitzy wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 8:11 am
jztemple2 wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 3:34 am Hmm, I'm several hours into a new game using Intrigue and my previously selected Civilizations are there. But of course they were there before I installed Intrigue, so maybe that's the different.

OK, I'm confused. How do I build legions in the game? Not garrisons, just legions to put on transports. I tried the wiki but I didn't see anything that helped.
As I recall there’s a building that will allow construction of legions on the planet you build it. Also generals come with a few. Assuming this hasn’t been changed.
A general comes with 5 legions, and you can build more with a military center (planet improvement). They're expensive, and some races also need resources, but by mid- to late-game you can crank them out pretty steadily.

It took me quite awhile to realize that you can't un-garrison legions or use transports to shuttle them around. Once you remove them from the pool, they're stuck where you put them.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

So I played about ten hours in my campaign using the Intrigue DLC. I started on a Huge map but with only six civs to avoid crowding but it still got kind of busy.

Since I thought I'd be away from the others for awhile I concentrated on non-military research which mean that about at hour five when I started running into people I was behind militarily. I was bumping into the B'Atuum who were second militarily while I was fifth. They didn't like me at all and declared war on me, but I beat up a few of their fleets and destroyed a starbase or two and so we got peaceful. I noted that they were still mad at me, but were Pragmatic so maybe they would go pick on someone else.

As noted in a previous post, I created a Commonwealth. They did contribute to me, but when it became crunch time with the Drengins they refused to join me in war since they had switched to a government type that prohibited them from going to war. This was a big pain later on and it was why I switched from my starting gov through another till I finally got one where I could control twelve colonies rather than four. In the end by the tenth hour I had only switched to one other government, one geared for war with double the cash income.

As usual it was the Drengins that loused things up for me. They left me alone while beating up on the Onyx Hive, but eventually went to war with me. The Hive surrendered to the Drengins but turned over several of their colonies and ships to me so as to keep up the good fight. A couple of the colonies were useful, but one was so far away I should have just turned it into a Commonwealth rather than pour fund into it, as the Drengins eventually captured it.

While there was action on other fronts, the war with the Drengins focused on the Onyx Prime front, which consisted of the two original home worlds of the Hive, Onyx Prime and Stone. It felt like the WW1 front between Italy and Austria where the places were captured, recaptured and captured back again endlessly. I'd capture one then as I captured the other the Drengins would grab the first one back. And when things finally got settled on those two worlds and I sent my battlefleet to attack a nearby Drengin starbase, damn if the Drengins didn't slip a fleet in the back way and recaptured a world again.

In the end, I gave up when the B'Atuum, who had been battling with the Rebel Alliance (New Republic), a Workshop civ, decided to Pearl Harbor me and attacked three of my worlds on the same turn. So I was now facing the number one and number two military civs on the map and the Rebel Alliance wouldn't attack the Drengins, even though the Rebels were my allies, because their government wouldn't let them declare war. The B'Atuum had much bigger ships, better tech and a bigger economy just by themselves, so I called it quits.

As in previous games, I didn't have much use for the Mercenaries, too expensive for just one ship. And the new Market was just of limited value for me as I hadn't progressed far enough in the tech tree to need some of the more exotic materials and what I did need I got on the map.

I hated the new Crisis mechanic. Some oddball crisis would come up and I'd have little idea what was the right way to address it, so I would just pick one of the three options whenever they were given to me and hope for the best. There's enough going on in the game without this distraction. And unless they are included in the Mega Events setting of game options, I'm not sure you can even turn them off.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

tgb wrote: Fri Apr 13, 2018 6:47 am Apparently I had to access the Workshop from the race selection screen before they would appear. Must be something added into 3.0
I missed your post so I was wondering why a collection of civilizations I downloaded from the Workshop wasn't working. Yup, I had to access just one of them from inside of the game and then all of them showed up. By the way, it's the GC III - Faction Repository - MyOwn which in spite of being labeled just Factions really are all Civilizations. I played against the B'Atuum in my first game and I just started another game playing as the Asgard Council.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Well, having some time to kill, I decided to make a civilization for GC3. Casting about for ideas, I noticed on my calendar a reminder that the TV show Archer returns this month. Searching the Steam Workshop I was surprised that no one had made an Archer civilization. So I made one, Archer In The Galaxy. It's pretty much PG since I'm not that, well, Archer-ish, but I hope it captures some of the flavor.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

"Wreaking havoc," not "reeking." Although I suppose one could reek havoc, IDK what that would smell like.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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Kraken wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 1:28 am "Wreaking havoc," not "reeking." Although I suppose one could reek havoc, IDK what that would smell like.
Eeek! Spelling is not my strong suit, I'll make the change. Thanks!
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Lorini »

Kraken wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 1:28 am "Wreaking havoc," not "reeking." Although I suppose one could reek havoc, IDK what that would smell like.
Don't wanna know!!! :)
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

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jztemple2 wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 2:58 am
Kraken wrote: Sat Apr 14, 2018 1:28 am "Wreaking havoc," not "reeking." Although I suppose one could reek havoc, IDK what that would smell like.
Eeek! Spelling is not my strong suit, I'll make the change. Thanks!
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by tgb »

Is food shared throughout your empire? I culture-flipped a colony on a barren world, and it can't grow squat. I'm wondering if I'm better off just abandoning it.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

Pre-Intrigue, food was a global commodity. As long as your number was high enough, you could build cities anywhere. AFAIK that hasn't changed; they just changed the rules for growing it. I don't think you can build farms on non-fertile tiles anymore, so you won't be able to feed your whole empire with one or two farming planets. Food tiles are like other resource tiles now -- they can be upgraded, but you can't make more of them. But I'm still only a few hours into it and haven't researched any ag techs yet, so I'm not sure that I understand it correctly.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by ChuckB »

Quick question - have had the game for a long time now but never really picked it up. Started the tutorial yesterday and couldn't find any "path preview" function, meaning a way to see how a ship will get to the destination I designate with the right button and (maybe even more importantly), how many turns it'll take? It's strange because the tutorial specifically calls it "path preview" but it seems to only show after I commit via right mouse button - am I missing something?

Thanks!
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

ChuckB wrote: Mon Apr 16, 2018 6:06 pm Quick question - have had the game for a long time now but never really picked it up. Started the tutorial yesterday and couldn't find any "path preview" function, meaning a way to see how a ship will get to the destination I designate with the right button and (maybe even more importantly), how many turns it'll take? It's strange because the tutorial specifically calls it "path preview" but it seems to only show after I commit via right mouse button - am I missing something?

Thanks!
Hmm, I think this has been mentioned before, that there is no path preview. Certainly at 70 hours I've never noticed it. Next time I fire up the game I'll poke around in the options and see if maybe it's just labeled weirdly.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by ChuckB »

jztemple2 wrote: Mon Apr 16, 2018 8:37 pm
ChuckB wrote: Mon Apr 16, 2018 6:06 pm Quick question - have had the game for a long time now but never really picked it up. Started the tutorial yesterday and couldn't find any "path preview" function, meaning a way to see how a ship will get to the destination I designate with the right button and (maybe even more importantly), how many turns it'll take? It's strange because the tutorial specifically calls it "path preview" but it seems to only show after I commit via right mouse button - am I missing something?

Thanks!
Hmm, I think this has been mentioned before, that there is no path preview. Certainly at 70 hours I've never noticed it. Next time I fire up the game I'll poke around in the options and see if maybe it's just labeled weirdly.
Thanks - I don't think there is one. I checked the options and did an online search but couldn't find anything. Again, less an issue with the pathing (in space ...) but the distance/# of turns would be interesting to know upfront, hate to count hexes on the screen by myself ...
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Island Dog »

Happy 3rd Anniversary, Galactic Civilizations III!

It's been 25 years since the first Galactic Civilizations was conceived and Stardock was founded. Today, we're taking a look back on the evolution of the beloved series.

https://forums.galciv3.com/488927/galci ... nniversary

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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Ah, nostalgia! I've been launching my money into the galactic void since the original GalCiv for Windows :D

Still a great game series, but I wish I was more creative, my designs in the ship builder are so lame :(
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Jeff V »

jztemple2 wrote: Mon May 14, 2018 5:58 pm Still a great game series, but I wish I was more creative, my designs in the ship builder are so lame :(
I wish ship building was a little more meaningful. Very occasionally I find myself going there, create something completely ridiculous that serves the purpose because it's chock full of some weapon or contains multiple starbase modules or somesuch. They look like ass because making them look good takes effort and offers nothing functional, just aesthetical.
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Island Dog »

GalCiv III, the Intrigue expansion, and the Gold bundle are all on sale in the Steam sale. Great time to pick it up. :)
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Galactic Civilizations III - Heroes of Star Control: Origins DLC has been released. Adds:
Major Factions

Tywom - Hello, best friends! These yellow slug-like aliens would like a hug. They’re slimy, and you don’t want to give them one, but still - it’s all they really want. The Tywom want to be friends with everyone, which makes them great diplomats, and their constant desire for approval gives them a bonus for any other factions who happen to love them.

Mowlings - All hail the mighty Jeff! The Mowlings are small, bear-like creatures who worship a mysterious deity they call Jeff. Frankly, they’re a little lost without him, so they spend their time finding new ways to worship him. The Mowlings get a special Temple of Jeff improvement (one per planet) that grants bonuses to influence and approval, and in return Jeff orbits their planets protectively.

Mu’Kay - Greetings, federation member! Founders of the Federation for Allied Species, the Mu’Kay are intelligent cephalopods who live entirely in aquatic environments. Their natural intelligence makes them excellent researchers, and their polite (if occasionally condescending) manner lends itself well to diplomacy. Unless you’re a fish. Then prepare to be eaten.

Free Trandals - Cast off the shackles! The Free Trandals are the escaped faction of a race that has been enslaved by a malevolent AI known only as Overmind, who uses their bodies to advance its own nefarious purposes. Now, the Free Trandals work to free their brethren and rebuild their lost culture with what little they have left. Possessing a surprising capability (and healthy paranoia) for advanced technology, the Free Trandals are far from helpless both on and off the battlefield. Their warrior instincts may be long buried, but their ships, while few in number, are enormously effective against silicon and synthetic based life forms.

Features

- 4 new major factions with unique leaders, ship designs, music, and traits
- Dozens of new ship parts inspired by Star Control: Origins for building and modifying your own ships
- Several new music tracks from Star Control: Origins
- New faction traits: Needy, Divine Guardian, Unshackled, Federation
- New ship designs, colors, and styles
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Also, update 3.1 has been released:
GalCiv III v3.1 ( Released 11/12)
Hello,

We want to give you a small preview of the upcoming v3.1 patch. We've improved the AI and gameplay, as well as giving our modders the ability to design their color palettes for custom factions and ships.

Highlights

Synthetic AI Improvements
Synthetic races are better at killing you. They also have decided that farming is neither relaxing or productive. Synthetics have not only abandoned farming but now will burn arable land to clear it for improvements.

Custom Colors
You can now deck your custom content in style. Design your own color palettes for custom factions, ships, the UI and maps.

Change Log notes
AI Improvements

Synthetic races are better at killing you
Synthetic life forms will not longer try to build farms. Instead, they'll destroy the arable tiles to make room for something more useful to them.
Crusade: AI better at gaining citizens at higher difficulty levels.

Balance

Fertile tiles are more common.
Mercenaries: Avatar mercenary antimatter cost increased from 1 to 5.
Crusade:
Prolific ability population growth reduced from 0.2 to 0.1 (otherwise it was basically tripling initial population growth).
Aururus Arberetum provides a % growth benefit instead of a flat so that a given player (such as an AI player) doesn't gain a disproportionate advantage from having one.
Intrigue: Changed the "Destroyed Planets" crisis outcomes to be only "mostly destroyed"

Interface

Custom Colors: Design your own color palettes for custom factions, ships, the UI and maps.
Population growth now shows to 2 significant digits.
Added a button on the title window to force sync the mods. Use this if you have subbed/unsubbed to ships or civs outside of the game and that content isn't showing up correctly.
Crusade: Shows your leader instead of the news robot


Bugs

Fixed a few MP crashes
Typo fixes: For extreme colonize, it is Barren, not Desert planet types.
Base Game only: AI will not try to research Crusade specific techs.
Mercenaries: AI no longer tries to "mine" the Bazaar
And here's a look at the Custom Color interface:
Image
My father said that anything is interesting if you bother to read about it - Michael C. Harrold
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jztemple2
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Oops, sorry, one more bit of news :doh:. To be fair, I just saw it :roll:

The Galactic Civilizations III Gold bundle is on sale for 87% percent off. Even if there are parts of it you don't care about ($9.99 for the soundtrack?) this is a good deal if like me you've waited on a few of the DLC. Sadly the new DLC is not included in the deal, but it is 10% off as well, so if might be worthwhile to grab it all at once.
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Kraken
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

They want money for content ported in from another game? Hah. Oh, it's only $6? Well, maybe someday then. Haven't played this game in quite awhile but I'm sure I'll go back to it eventually.
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jztemple2
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by jztemple2 »

Kraken wrote: Mon Nov 12, 2018 8:06 pm They want money for content ported in from another game? Hah. Oh, it's only $6? Well, maybe someday then. Haven't played this game in quite awhile but I'm sure I'll go back to it eventually.
I don't think it was ported as much as inspired by, although some of the artwork might be borrowed. Basically it adds four new factions which is nice.

For anyone thinking about getting GalCiv III this is a good opportunity to get all the released content save the newest dlc all at once for a nice price.
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Kraken
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Re: Galactic Civilizations III Released!

Post by Kraken »

jztemple2 wrote: Mon Nov 12, 2018 9:23 pm
Kraken wrote: Mon Nov 12, 2018 8:06 pm They want money for content ported in from another game? Hah. Oh, it's only $6? Well, maybe someday then. Haven't played this game in quite awhile but I'm sure I'll go back to it eventually.
I don't think it was ported as much as inspired by, although some of the artwork might be borrowed. Basically it adds four new factions which is nice.
The factions caught my attention. I played the hell out of GC3 for a few months until I had won at least once as every faction (including a couple of custom ones that I downloaded and one I made myself). Four new ones (and a patch) are a tempting reason to go back. Eventually. For now, I'm happily lost in the Wasteland. And then there's that XCOM2 mod that everybody's playing now. And then there's FO New California. But I will come back to 4x someday, and I just can't quite get into Civ6. Maybe when its expansion gets cheap enough.... :D
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