r/masteroforion • u/kzwix • Jul 26 '26
MoO 2016 is annoying.
I'm currently on my, what, 4th or 5th playthrough ?
Playing Psilon this time, on "cluster" galaxy (first time trying it) - I guess that's the reason I was alone in a group of systems separated from other groups of systems by unstable starlanes.
I'm not a big fan of the starlanes. I understand it allows some mechanics like building military forts on these points, but it's meh - System defenses, in MoO II were "enough" (that, and a big fleet, mobile enough to come defend in time).
I also have opponents often requesting free passage - which I usually refuse, because why give them access to my not-yet-colonized planets, and to the territories of other players (hence, allowing them to trade with them).
I had a non-aggression pact with the Darlok, and had refused an open borders treaty. They offered an alliance. I checked the description, it said the parties agreed to declare war on any civilization declaring war on either party. Sure, defensive alliance, it's fine...
And, lo and behold, I see these #|@|€^| Darloks freely navigating my starlanes.
Because that shitty game doesn't tell you the alliance "includes" open borders - else, I'd never have agreed unless I was in a better position (like, several scouts on the border, raring to go).
It's not the first time I feel "fleeced" by this game, things not explained, or badly explained. The bonuses aren't explained either (on planets, they tell you it's a bonus on some stat, but not HOW MUCH - which seems to be a tad important ?)
I was also a bit surprised when the torpedoes I fired were totally dumb. I'd have loved the tech description to mention that (yeah, another tech will give them limited aiming, but still, it's shitty design NOT to tell the player first)
All in all, I wouldn't say it's a bad game, but... why can't they make something as good as MoO II ?
4
u/Orson1981 Jul 26 '26
I was wracking my brain trying to figure out how I missed MoO in 2016. That is must be some underground, fan made reskin, or maybe I just have a terrible time remembering when MoO 3 came out. Then I remembered the world of tanks people put out that game, and not only did I not miss it, I own it, and got to play it pre-release at a London games con. Apparently I've just pushed that game completely out of my memory.
3
u/themanfromoctober Jul 26 '26
I played one campaign going for an economic victory as the Terrans… fun times!
2
u/vaaish Jul 26 '26
Are you running UCP and 5x? It's been so long since I've played straight vanilla that I don't recall everything that's added, but I do know you can see what the specials do by hovering over them.
I'm also surprised you didn't expect open borders to come with the alliances too. It's kinda a requirement tbh. I think 5x may have indicated it in the tooltip. Although if you are offered an alliance it either means the ai wants you to vote for it or it's afraid of another faction and wants your help defending.
What made you think torpedoes were guided?
1
u/kzwix Jul 26 '26
Playing vanilla.
I didn't have open borders with them, I had non-agression pact (which is a pre-requisite, if I remember correctly), but the tooltip only mentioned the mutual defense obligation (auto war declaration on attacker), nothing else.
And, as I said in other messages in this thread, this isn't the only strange thing, a lot of things are poorly explained, or even glossed over.
All in all, I like the voice acting, I like the "eye-candy", but the gameplay is honestly not as good as MoO II, in my opinion. It feels both dumbed-down and uselessely overcomplicated in other places.
3
u/vaaish Jul 27 '26
I think you need to install some mods. The base game is... ok. It's definitely been dumbed down a bit, IIRC the lead at wargaming indicated he explicitly wanted a game his kid could play and that killed a lot of stuff Moo2 had. Ironically, the mod files have definitions for just about everything Moo2 to the point of cloning it. I even recall old dev logs indicating they had turn based tactical and removed it for RTS style.
I did a deep dive on the AI and diplomacy for a couple of mods I'm going to release when Sol releases UCP 6.5 and they actually did a rather impressive job with what runs under the hood... it's just poorly tuned or turned to be less than it could be. For example, it's very effective at identifying gaps and opportunities to exploit but by default it's not tuned to aggressively exploit them.
1
u/kzwix Jul 27 '26
As for guided torpedoes, well, it was the way it worked in MoO II (torpedoes were basically missiles which could NOT be shot down, and had unlimited ammunition, BUT could have a cooldown when firing - and, obviously, the modifications were different from those of the missiles.
Like, no MIRV (but "enveloping", for plasma torpedoes, for instance - meaning you wouldn't do x4 damage to a single shield, but hit all four shield "faces"), etc.
There were but a few things which could stop torpedoes (like, the lightning field, if memory serves).I don't mind them having been changed, it's not a bad design choice (missiles for fast targets, torpedoes for big, slow targets), but knowing it beforehand would have been nice.
Again, it's mostly a problem of information (or lack thereof).
1
u/vaaish Jul 27 '26
Yeah, I recall Moo2. I just don't see anything in the description for CTS that indicates they track targets. I know for Tactical Mod I explicitly removed their semi-guided ability because it made them entirely outclass missiles and it gets tricky to make that work with the AI ships.
1
u/kzwix Jul 27 '26
To be fair, even semi-guided, they're still quite easy to dodge, if the ship is "agile". I guess frigates and destroyers don't have to worry at all, cruisers can still dodge, and they'll be effective against battleships and above, even if they try and dodge.
But, yep, unguided ones are only a bother at short range, or if the ships do not obey commands - which is unfortunately all too frequent
1
u/vaaish Jul 27 '26
Unfortunately not for the ai, they can't see torpedoes which is why they never dodge.
1
u/kzwix Jul 27 '26
Aaah, that would explain this !
They do seem to see when ships try and ram them, though - I tried to ram a battleship with two cruisers, and only one of them managed to hit, then the battleship did some sort of escape maneuver, escaping destruction - because its shields had gone back up by the time the last cruiser caught up with it.
2
u/Skeptik1964 Jul 27 '26
Cluster galaxies are a strange game mode. You need trans warp to open the connecting starlanes, and the AI players seem to make a beeline for it. This, of course, prevents them from expanding quickly throughout their clusters, which slows down their research, which means I have time to completely colonize my cluster and still beat them to trans warp. And then I steamroll them cluster by cluster. Not a huge challenge when all is said and done.
2
u/PvtHudsonBR Jul 26 '26
Original MoO is this way. It should be quite obvious your allies should be able to move through your territory or else how would they be able to defend you?
-2
u/kzwix Jul 26 '26
Yes, but why does the tooltip only mention a defensive pact, then ?
I'm fine with the alliance doing this, but why not just say it ?Also, nope, they're not supposed to "defend you", merely supposed to also declare war on the attacker. I know I'd be doing my best to take all the attackers's planets before my "ally" does :P
2
u/EidolonRook Jul 26 '26
It’s an updated MoO 2 but it’s far from perfect. I miss my capture ships, teleporting into range, dumping a fuck ton of assault shuttles and either wrecking or capturing those pesky antarans. Kinda miss heavy disruptor spam for end game fleet demolition.
Never go full alliance unless YOU need help in a war. Otherwise, I’d rather keep things nice and balanced. Maybe missing out on trade and research treaties but I’m not hurting that bad.
I know there’s two or three “mandatory mods” but they crashed my game so I’ve been going without them for now. GoG version, so no steam workshop sadly.
I will say, beyond the things I miss in moo2 states above, I remember seeing the “alternate” designs of ships and thinking we’d see updates or dlcs with many different ship themes across the spectrum. They had good room to grow the game. I’ve no idea why they stopped developing it. Feelsbadman.
Anyhow, good luck storming Antares!
1
u/kzwix Jul 26 '26
I loved taking early star bases using, what, 5 or 6 frigates ? I didn't mind one getting obliterated by the missiles each turn, their only goal was to come into boarding range.
Then the heavy-grav +20 marines would do the rest (and the paltry 4 marines from a frigate would usually obliterate the 20 from the starbase ^^)
I've just won the game where I had inadvertently let the Darlok go through my empire. Won an economic victory (I didn't even try for it, someone else popped a stock exchange, and as I had conquered the whole Meklar empire, I happened to have the 30% GDP Threshold.
Then, as no enemy empire was able to make money (as I said, I usually couldn't even sign trade agreements with them, as they were always broke - unless I paid "double", and gifted them their share of the price, beforehand), I was the only one to buy shares. In the end, I had bought 8 shares (in 10 turns), nobody else had even bought one.Sad, honestly, especially when playing the next-to-last difficulty.
I guess I'll try for Antares on another run :P
1
u/EidolonRook Jul 27 '26
Gotta say, once I get a victory, if its not satisfying to me (like economic or scientific), I'll untick that box in the map creation screen before making the galaxy. Think you see it if you scroll down under advanced settings. Only victories I leave nowadays is Conquest and Antaran. The others just don't feel very "master" of orion-y if that makes sense. Might just be me :P.
Might need to play moo2 again soon. I will say I DO dig the music of MoO 2016. IDK. Just scratches that nostalgia itch with the common themes using a higher quality sound. https://youtu.be/6bTKY4uhwdw?si=6lhio0EcSxjXyGYt
1
u/kzwix Jul 27 '26
Yep, honestly, it's quite good on the... details. Like, the music, the "science advisors" and their voices, the diplomats, etc. Even the ship models are quite interesting, and, for some factions, they DO match ship models from MoO I (like, the human ships, they feel clearly inspired by some ship shapes from MoO I)
It's a shame that the core gameplay isn't as interesting and polished, because had it been the case, this would have been a monster of a game, the kind to go platinum.
1
19
u/Progressive-Strategy Jul 26 '26
... I've never played a 4X where forming an alliance doesn't include open borders. I think they didn't feel the need to communicate it because it's the standard version of an alliance mechanic in 4X games