1. Add a "Secondary Mission" menu for ships that contains all of the ship functions now controlled by friendly codes.  This includes things like Make Torpedoes (mkt), Clone Ship (cln), Do Not Use Torpedoes or Fighters (NTP), etc.  The player can then choose only 1 of the menu options.  The Primary Mission menu would stay the same as it is now, and there would be no crossover between primary and secondary missions.  A player can choose 1 primary mission and 1 secondary mission for each ship.
2. Add a "Battle Order" field for ships.  This would be a 2- or 3-digit number to determine the order that your ships enter combat in any given fight.  It would not matter if an enemy ship has the same battle order value as one of your ships; they would still fight in the order you want them to.  If 2 or more of your ships at the same location have the same battle order number, their battle order would be determined by ship ID.
3. Add an "Access List" to planets.  This would let you allow any player or players to have access to that planet's resources.  The Birdman Superspy mission would put them on this list.
4. Have the most advantageous VCR position based on ship experience.  The docs say that ship experience is accumulated, but invisible to players.  This would be a way to let that experience mean something more than it does now.  Two similar ships with the same experience would have their VCR position based on ship ID.
5. EDIT:  Ignore this one.  Change the Primary Enemy menu to a checkbox menu that allows multiple selections.  This would remove the restriction to a single enemy and allow ships to attack any ship or planet owned by any enemy on their list.
6. Add a "Priority" field on starbases to use with priority build points.

1. how can this be implemented into the battle order? it is part of it.  do ships surrender then, if you guess the secondary mission?
2. if ships could read, that they are going to the same spot or will intercept the same ship, then you could do this in a battle menu without typing digits. how do you access the battle menu with one click?
   
3. Allow access once + allow acces permanently?
4. Why not? should be tested - but takes a bit from the learning curve
5. That's what the 'Kill' mission is for. Multiple Enemies change too much. Doesn't make sense but is part of the game.
   
6. Yes, and it should check, if another base has the same code.
   

-1

Once you start thinking about it, some of these changes would have a profound impact on the complexity of the game and many tactics that many players use would change. 

More than one PE? Privs can forget about towing to a wolf pack and the chance of not getting destroyed because the enemies ship is set ot another PE that he perceives as a bigger threat. 

VCR position? this removes the risk/gamble for trying to get on the correct side and ending up with matching FC's.  This also applies to a pre-ordained battle order.  Wheres the risk in trying to make torps while attempting for that ship to fight first and from the correct side.  If you haven't got torps available then its the decision you make of going into battle first but on the wrong side and the possiblity of losing is yours to make.  Being able to mkt or lfm AND battle on the side of your choice AND in the correct battle order is more of a point and shoot facility.

What happens with the rare possibility that you can force a surrender due to matching FC's?  This is a risk that every cloaking ship enters into when he orbits an enemy SB.

The kill mission is currently a trade off between being able to attack all ships who wander into the same point in space OR being able to lay mines, sweep, cloak, dark sense, hiss etc etc and only be able to attack the current PE.  Its a choice the player should have to make based upon his/hers circumstances rather than PE set to all but allies.

What happens with minefield FC's when you want to give another player passage through without having any form of alliance?  Fireclouds chunneling uses the current FC system.    Should a firecloud be able to chunnel to a low ID Firecloud without the risk of having to fight first if enemy ships arrive/decloak at the destination?

Don't get me wrong, I am all for changing the UI to make things easier and clearer, the current chunnelling/HYP system is an example but they are still based on the current FC system.  The game is fundamentally based around the FC system which enables you to do one thing and not be able to do another......    "Should I scoop these mines and take a chance on the battle order or do I ensure that I am first to fight and on the right side of the VCR?"  .... " Do I risk having a FC code of 101 to ensure that I am on side of the VCR that I want and risk having a matching FC and ending up with my second ship fighting first or do I lessen the risk of a matching code with FC 125 but possibly being on the wrong side and at a disavantage?"

The game is about choices, risk, guts, chance and a little luck.  Some of these changes will take this away from the game.

-1

FC are as important to how VGAP is played as the ship limit or tech levels. You just can't change that or it's not the same game anymore.

Unintended limitation or not, removing FC would fundamentally change many many aspects of a game that has been finely tuned and balanced over the course of many years by millions of players. The list of things that ships can't do simultaneously because of FC is a mile long and changing that has a huge effect. It's not a question of convenience, it's a question of fundamental game changes. You might as well take away ships altogether and have the planets attack each other, it's no less of a fundamental game change.

-1

As a cloaking torp race, no FC's would severely limit my ability.  The FC's were made to help certain races.  Carrier races can make fighters in space, but I can't make torps or lay smaller minefields?  There are hundreds of commands a commander must make each turn.  Everyone misses a few now and then and then slapps themselves on the head.  Those that are in several games tend to miss more then others.  I prefer to be in only one or two games at a time because of this time consuming monitoring.  AND, I count on those who are in more gams to miss a few more then me.  The more cutomized the better.  If ya can't handle it, stay out of my system ;-) 

Quite a few strong veiw points here, mine being said above.  I tend to have to agree with quite a few statements including;

• Removal of FC's will fundamentally change the game.
• FC's are confusing for new players and even older players alike.
• UI can be improved to simplfy the FC's.
• FC's are an archaic system.

These statements are obviously contradictory but I do believe that there can be a solution that is a happy medium.  I am thinking about this as I type so there may be some flaws but a system as follows may be some sort of solution.

Create a 'Secondary Mission' to replace the FC.  From this you will be able to choose either "Make Torpedoes" OR "Battle Order" OR "Load Fighter Materials" OR "Moly Alchemy" OR "Lay 50 torps as mines" OR "No Instigated Battle" etc etc etc.  The point of this would be to keep battle order separate from say mkt and therefore you cannot do both in the same turn as per currently.

The battle order would run from say 0-100 and would give a random Freindly Code as per the current system.  Having a battle order of say 10 would give a random FC of 100-109 (11 would be 110-119  etc etc) to coincide with the current sytem.  Whether this FC is shown on the UI, should be up to the user.  Have "No Instigated Battle" (or a similar name)  would generate a random non-numeric FC.

Planets/Starbases would be able to have options as they already have for cloning, PB1 etc but in addition have an option for Peace status (random non-numeric FC) or Agressive status (random numeric FC).  Would also need to add most ship FC's in here to maintain the current "Force A Surrender" tactic or grab HYP tactic and all the other ones we all know about.  Again, whether the actual FC is shown on the UI is up to the user.

The user interface for Fireclouds and Hypers already use this sytem.  Hit the button and it changes the FC.  Whether the user needs to see this FC, well, again should be up to the user.

Obviously, this would need a great deal more thought than the 5 minutes I have just put in but it would enable a much more simplistic interface for new users etc, it will maintain the core functionality of the game and also enable die hard veterans to play as they always have.

The FC's system needs to stay within the game BUT the UI can be adapted to hide this system while still using it.  If that makes sense.

[quote]Ships not attacking and stealing ships with the starbase are part of the game.

In my opinion, these examples are flaws in the game.  If you are aware of these flaws, you can work them to your advantage.  If you are a new player (or unaware), they are just frustrating.

[/quote]

That is ridiculous.  You could make the same argument for "not knowing what warp wells are" or "not knowing to put torpedoes on your ships" or "not knowing that megacredits are not global" or "not knowing that your opponents can build ships too".  The game has depth and complexity that allow for experienced commanders to manipulate details to gain advantage.  Fooling opponents with friendly codes is front and center of that element of the game.  If you start to trim parts of the game because you got burned by them, or you don't fully understand them, you are falling victim to one of the classic blunders.  The most famous is "Never get involved in a land war in Asia." Seriously, for less complex tactics, try Elf Bowling.

Now, if we are talking about making the whole friendly code thing less of an eyesore (it is such a hack job), then it requires a different approach.  We can begin by changing the name to something other than Friendly Code, as its function has gone way beyond that.  A few come to mind.

Security Code, Ship Code, Function Code, Central Access Code, etc.

Then, you want a complete menu of codes visible any time a player is making a change.  There also needs to be a text box under the friendly code box.  If a player uses "msc", that box should have color-coded text with the words "Scooping Up Mines" clearly visible IFF the ship can possibly do it.  If a player has a planet set to "bum", the text should read "Beaming all Megacredits up to Enemy Ships".  If the friendly code is something random, it is an empty box.  The better the graphic on this, the more convincing the change will be.  Alternatively, hover text could accomplish the same thing, but then the code has to glow to attract the user's attention to it.

Donald, that is a really good point.  I think the general consensus about VGAP 4 is that it failed in a number of ways, and the confounding GUI was a primary offender of the problems.  But another one was the enormous number of hidden "features" that had no documentation, and made the game annoyingly random.  FCs really aren't that hard.  We just need a way to make them clear to new players. I think it can be done with Joshua's current approach once he has a chance to enhance it.  It just needs a really great interface with lots of reminder info available (perhaps if you click it), and I believe a more appropriate name that tips off new users to how important it can be.

In general, I think the interface should aim to give users an idea of how the ship is going to act in plain indications  (not text, but a player should be able to extrapolate easily):

This ship will load fighter minerals, then build fighters, then intercept, and then attack any Bird Man vessels and/or planets, in that order.

This ship will move to its waypoint and activate its glory device if there are any cloaked vessels in orbit there.  If not it will pillage the planet.

This ship will lay mines, then make torpedoes with mkt, then move one light year in the warp well.

and so on...

@ Daniel Payne

I like the idea of a ship summary, there is even room for this at the bottom of the ship screen.  This would enable a readable version of the ship commands and would also help to some extent with visualizing the host order.  Maybe also highlight the actions i.e. "move", "lay mine", "pillage".

Would be extremely helpful for new players and at a glance would help all players in case they have forgotton to do something like the ship is still set to hyp, chunnel, beam up fuel etc.

@thin lizzy

I think thats more complicated than just Fcodes AND your changing the mechanics.

If you use a secondary mission code you'd need th interface to prevent battleorder being set to preserve the mechanics.

And planets side orders like - Guess ships secondary mission ? whats that about - not sure I like that.

• Make Torpedoes
• Transfer torpedoes equally to foreign ships
• Do not use torpedoes for attack
• Drop certain number of mines >>   flyout
  

• Lay Mines in another species' identity >> flyout
  

• Scoop Mines
• Give this ship to:                    >> flyout

• Use Universal Minefiels Code  >> flyout

• Transfer Megacredits to Planet
• Clone this Ship

• Use other ship type's mission orders (No direct function):

• Use Planetary Mission Orders (No direct function)

• Beam up money
• Attack Ships with fuel
• Attack all Ships
• Recycle ship components
• Build ship first (more than 20 priority points required)
• Build ship second (more than 20 priority points required)
• Build ship third (more than 20 priority points required)
• Set Unversal Minefield Code >>  flyout

• Use Mission Order for ships (No direct function)

I like the idea of keeping the GUI clean, so the current look is fine.  If the code has an associated function (lfm), the label Friendly Code becomes a different color and says "Function Code".  If it is a battle order (101), it becomes a different color and the label says "Battle Code".  Then you can use hover text to give the details of the code.

This means that there would need to be a classification scheme.  I am sure that will not be hard work.

One more thing.  I would like to see a battle sequence value somewhere on the interface that takes PE, Kill mission, and FC into account if that is possible.