Hello everyone at StarDock and here at the forums!!!Cheers 
I finally decided to take the plunge and try out the beta 4. I am a longtime Stardock fan and own many games and desktop products. I am glad to see them partnered with Steam now, since the PC gaming market is having hard times. To my credit, I have been playing these types of games for 30 years, and made a few mods for a few games.
I have mostly enjoyed playing a couple of games of the beta 4, and would like to share my initial thoughts.
I do not have time to browse the forums to search for these topics. My time is pretty limited nowadays. However, I wanted to express my thoughts and concerns for the state of this current Beta, hoping that I would be heard! I will try and be "To the point" as much as possible. I also have no idea what is being implemented, but I feel this is important enough for SD to consider.
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I feel that too much effort is being focused on the battle viewer at this time, I'm not sure how big of a team is working on this game, but there are so many other game play issues and bugs, that I fear could cause much larger delays.
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Hull designs and upgrades; I want a simple check box that I can check multiple items, then hit a delete, obsolete, or upgrade button (or right click) and do it all at once! I am tired of wasting my time doing it, one at a time. I also want available in main right hand side screen on the main page. It is sad I have only played 3 games and already, I am beginning to hate that part of the game.
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Good grief, there are 10x the amount of templates than needed, tone them down!!(or have them obsolete themselves)
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Thank you for toning down the laser size in the newer version, but I think they still need toned down by hull class.
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Tone the influence WAY down it is far too powerful, it needs distance fading implemented. The further away from the HOMEWORLD the weaker it gets, but can get boosts from just ONE and only ONE building on a planet or Starbase. Spamming of culture on planets ruins the game while lessening the value and importance of the Ideology Trait's. Ideology Traits bonuses also need halved (maybe more). I would also check for bugs because it seems broken to me.
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Since the Space “viewer” is now an integral part of the game, it has shown me that ship hull designs are seriously flawed. Small ships should in no way be able to do the devastation that they do, as compared to larger hulls.(not without superior numbers)
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Hull sizes need bonuses and penalties to even out all classes of ships. This would be the simplest way to equalize the combat of the game. Keeping true to the rock, paper, scissors philosophy. It would also prevent from having to do any major overhauls of anything.
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Carrier based fighters should be tiny hulls not small.
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Ships are not attacking SB's properly and need to close to engage. The way they fly around them is purely unnatural.
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Weapons ranges and Hull points need to be implemented on a per hull basis and need to be adjusted to representing different powers of ship size
Here is my idea for hulls or the approximate there of.(These are approximate values!! to show my point, game values are probably different)
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Tiny = 25 hp + 2x Maneuver + ¼ weapon range
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Small = 50 hp + 1.5x Maneuver + ½ weapons range
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Medium = 100 hp + 1x Maneuver 1x weapons range (baseline)
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Large = 250 hp + .75 Maneuver 1.25 weapons range
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Huge = 500 hp + .5 Maneuver +1.5 weapons range
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Civilian Star base = 1000 HP + 1.75 weapons range
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Military Star base = 1500 HP + 2.0 weapons range
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You can also use small graphics for the weapons for small ships, then increasing the size for medium etc. That would give a much better feel to size and “Epicness” of the Titans/Huge ships
I will be completely honest, about space battles. I am sure you have looked at or played Endless Space, the battles feel pretty epic. It does have it's flaws but the overall feel is pretty fun. Even as cool as it is to see the battles in GC 3, they feel 180 degrees out of phase to me. They feel like a bad Saturday morning cartoon. Basically, battle does not go the way it should, 5 fighters should not be able to destroy and entire stack of ships and a star base regardless of what tech I posses. Not even the rebellion could pull that off. A star base should be pretty darn hard to take down, if we (the AI and me) are going to spend all these resources and time building them.
The AI needs some serious work, I am actually very unimpressed with it compared to GC 2. I seriously hope you are not waiting until a month from now to unleash the Skynet AI??
Overall though, I do look forward to continued play as the game develops, which is a compliment. I am glad to have the space viewer added, because battles were why I quit playing GC 2. Because ultimately, watching the ships you design blow the crap out of something, makes you invested and that makes you “get into” the game so much more. That is what I wanted to see, ever since the fiasco they called MOO 3.
I want to say good job so far!!
Xeryx