Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » The Bar » Too time consuming?
| Too time consuming? |
Tue, 22 August 2006 07:17  |
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 PricklyPea |
 | Lieutenant |
Messages: 534
Registered: February 2005 | |
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Does anyone else have problems finding time for stars? I find it very time consuming and also occupies too much of my 'brain time' even when I'm away from the computer.
It's been the cause of a few disputes between my significant other (and my laptop was precariously dangled outside the window of our flat at one point!).
Does anyone have similar problems? I have a feeling that Bidding for Techs may be my last game.
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Tue, 22 August 2006 11:37  |
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| Marduk |
 | Ensign |
Messages: 345
Registered: January 2003
Location: Dayton, OH | |
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I've quit Stars! twice now for time reasons and each time took over a year to come back to it, so I understand how you feel.
A lot of it depends on how you play, and what kind of race you use. Diplomacy of any sort is a tremendous time-waster, if you do it right. Alliances take time to coordinate moves. Play in no-diplomacy or at least no-alliance games. Games that gen a turn every two days or on a regular three or four turn per week schedule are a lot easier to find time for than the one-a-day variety.
The kind of micromanagement you do is a major factor (the biggest for me). But the PRT you choose can go a long way towards reducing the workload. The PRT list reads like a 'most powerful' list, but the reason they are powerful is because they reward effort while requiring little.
For instance, there are two ways to play SD (as far as MM goes). On the one hand, you can invest huge amounts of time optimizing your minefields, laying them out just so for maximum effect and using them for all kinds of offensive activities. Or you can lean on SD's minelaying advantage - build more minelayers than normal and just set most of them up to run around in complicated repeat patterns, laying as they go. Once they're set up, forget about them and concentrate your MM efforts only on the fields at the front(s). As your space grows you occasionally need to add a few more minelayers, but again just set them up and let them run. Sometimes "good enough" is good enough. With your minefield speed advantage, settle for staying at safe speeds or one warp over on the attack and forget about sweeping entirely.
CA (no terraforming to worry about), IT (gates let you ignore a lot of things and putting excess pop into place faster reduces the pain of letting it overcrowd some), and JoaT (save a ton of scout management and cherry-pick your worlds) all let you get away with much less MM.
-f races in general are simpler. Research, build, attack, repeat until finished. One World Wonders are also very good for minimizing the time you spend on a game - with so few systems to worry about, even 'intense micromanagement' is relatively trivial.
Some races need a lot of fine control, at least during their growth stages, to be competitive. Other races benefit from more work but don't really need it. Stick to race designs that do okay without. Any spare time you end up having will help and if you don't have any it's no big deal. Plan your tech advancement order as part of your race design, and try to stick to it during play. That saves time agonizing over (for instance) whether to switch research fields to energy to take advantage of a couple of levels you got in battles, or sticking with con tech to get those BBs out on schedule. Even if they will only have the shields you originally planned on instead of the next model up, just think of it as taking advantage of miniaturization.
Read up on the repeatable orders and route orders. Automate as much as you can. Keeping a bunch of red worlds? Set one transport to automatically top off each set of four or five, and then manually fill that ship from another every 20 or 30 years. Not perfect pop management but you stay pretty close so who cares?
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Wed, 23 August 2006 06:06 |
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I play only one game at any time and even then there are times when I barely have time for Stars. As well many months into a game I sometimes get bored.
Perhaps we should partner more... 2 different people taking turns controlling the same empire. Preferably one player of the two is more skilled so it could also be training.
So for example in a game of skill level intermediate, an above average intermediate is allowed to find an advanced beginner player to do some of his turns, while giving a bit of coaching help.
[Updated on: Wed, 23 August 2006 06:08] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Wed, 23 August 2006 07:12 |
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| Kotk | 
 | Commander |
Messages: 1227
Registered: May 2003 | |
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| multilis wrote on Wed, 23 August 2006 13:06 |
So for example in a game of skill level intermediate, an above average intermediate is allowed to find an advanced beginner player to do some of his turns, while giving a bit of coaching help.
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I have aid beginners that way (by looking into turns and saying what i would do). Problem is that stars is not available anymore. Quite soon there are no beginners.
[Updated on: Wed, 23 August 2006 07:14] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Fri, 29 September 2006 00:26 |
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| Quote: |
I've 20k with tri-immune HE against the AI
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That is good enough to compete in a beginners game. Much may depend on your diplomacy skills.
Your HE will be a superpower if given enough time (HE continues to grow longer than normal races), but superpower will be needed to compensate for lack of gates. Try to stick to medium or smaller universes.
[Updated on: Fri, 29 September 2006 00:26] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Tue, 03 October 2006 08:59 |
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| Taka Tuka |
 | Master Chief Petty Officer |
Messages: 102
Registered: March 2004
Location: Germany | |
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| tgellan wrote on Mon, 02 October 2006 08:41 |
Well, why not hosting a game with the schedule of your liking?
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Some points:
- As a Host I wouldn't like to play in the same game. Imo a third party is needed.
- I have no experience with hosting.
- It seems to be, that mostly hardcore-stars!-players are left, who prefer very fast-running or very special designed games. O.K., a poll could fit. I'll think about.
- Less players means less deputies for holiday time as well. Once I was leading in a nice game and during my holidays my deputy ignored my style of playing and building - and my wishes as well. After I couldn't find "my" empire back again. It was so much different after (forgotten turn, lost fleets, open, direct flights from hidden bases/areas, ...), that my motivation droped down, and this after nearly 60 turns ...
I want to point out, that I don't know any deputy for my holiday time (mostly up to four weeks during January/February). And it's boring to invest much time and go to loose everything during holidays ...
But, o.k., may be a problem for many other players as well 
Taka Tuka
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Fri, 06 October 2006 06:47 |
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| ravanrooke |
 | Crewman 3rd Class |
Messages: 6
Registered: February 2004 | |
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Playing an aggressive SD in a large universe as part of the winning team some years back, I first dug into automating as much as possible. Automation does have the drawback that once you've set it up, it's harder to respond to change. For instance a freighter fleet in the middle of a mineral transport chain gets blown up. What were its orders again and how did it fit into the bigger plan? 
Besides automation there are a few things that helped greatly:
1. fleet naming: make some rules for naming fleets depending on purpose, and stick to them. Using the fleet report, you can then at a glance know which fleets can have idle status and which fleets need constant attention (and thematic names can make the MM more enjoyable).
2. shifting MM focus each turn: I would only take care of one (or two, occasionally) aspects of MM each turn, ensuring that each aspect of MM would get a _thorough_ review every four turns or so. This turned out to be MUCH better than a casual glance every turn! By MM aspect I mean: mining/transport fleet orders, production queues and routes, planetary queues and starbase upgrades, research and ship design, bundling of reinforcements and designating garrison fleets... I would also alternate between different fronts/battle theaters for an in-depth view if I was strapped for time.
I find this helped much more than less frequent turns (2 per week or so), since it's too easy to lose the picture and/or interest if the game doesn't flow (and takes four seasons, including your favourite outdoor season, to finish).
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| Re: Too time consuming? |
Wed, 01 November 2006 19:51 |
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| Taka Tuka |
| Master Chief Petty Officer |
Messages: 102
Registered: March 2004
Location: Germany | |
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The new game of Wizard could fit for us (busy players) 
Taka Tuka
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(thank god it happened at other times yet 
or pc would be out off the window for sure!)
You wrote two main reasons why I limited myself to games with about 30 stars per players. That number is still manageable within an hour, or two if I'm in an intense war. I also do my turns in evenings and nights, when my better part 
Think "chess on steroids" 
Re: Too time consuming?
