[quote who="Frogboy" reply="263" id="3694507"]
People really need to get over this concept of DLCs / expensions being "gouged".

If you want people to do work, you have to pay them.  It's as simple as that.

GalCiv II came out in 2006 and was $39.99.

GalCiv II Dark Avatar in 2007 and was $29.99.

GalCiv II Twilight of the Arnor in 2008 and was $29.99.

And if/when we make a GalCiv IV, there will be expansion packs and DLC for that.  Why? Because if people want more stuff, they have to pay for it because we're not your slaves.

I can't help but wonder if some of the people in this thread had ever had a job.
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For me, and this is for Brad in particular, I have been a good supporter of your games.  I have GC2 & GC3, Fallen Enchantress, Ashes of the Singularity.  My issues with your pricing is not about the DLC model, because I appreciate improvements to good games.  Galactic Civilizations 3 I only bought because I enjoyed GC2 which I played for probably 500 hours.  My issues with pricing is not about GC3's DLC's, it was about the sub-par state GC3  was in at release.  And when you finally make the game playable, Crusade DLC, you didn't discount it for those of us who had purchased the base game and all DLC's for a long period.  When you finally had a sale, you did not discount Crusade, you discounted the base game and all DLC's at the price of Crusade to new customers.  That is gouging your loyal customers. 

The base game, I completely understand discounting heavily to get new customers after a few years, but for those of us who bought the base game at full price and a couple of DLC's - to hold tight on the Crusade pricing was inexcusable (for your loyal customers).  Perhaps you disagree.  Eventually you did offer the full package discounted based on what you had bought previously - but it was done far too late.  It is only because of my positive experience with GC2 that I put up with it.  Take this as you will.

The game was playable at release for most players. The game was playable through to 1.5. It was playable up to 2.0. For years it has been playable. Whether it did or did not reach your expectations at launch is a separate issue. It didn't have everything that players from GC2 and EA wanted or expected according to some. Fine, there are valid criticisms. But, that doesn't mean the game was not 'playable'. Why does that entitle you to a discount for an expansion pack? You're consistent customer, and you like their games and would like to see more content. You either A: pay the asking price for their work at launch, or B: Don't. C: Wait for when/if it gets discounted. This isn't a 'mates rates' situation. They already rolled that idea into their founders program.

Sorry, Purdypog, we disagree entirely.  You seem to think that SD owes you something because you bought some of their games.

No, they don't.  You already got what you paid for.

Say, wasn't there a Parable about the workers coming late to the vineyard getting paid the same amount as the all-day workers?  You should read it sometime.

You buy a book of a series because you like what the author has written until now. You have some expectations because you enjoyed the books very much so far. You are disappointed by the new book. So you yell "I want the next book of the series at a discount because you didn't deliver what I expected!" Will that happen?

Ok, that is not entirely fair and not entirely comparable, but still ...

I've said this before, but I think it needs saying again: I paid $100USD or thereabouts to become one of the Founders - the idea of the "pay once, have an impact on the way the game is made and get all the DLC and Expansions" had me sold.

I never for one second thought my purchase was bigger than 0.0001% of the money Stardock have allocated to GalCiv 3. Heck, you can maybe add an extra zero after the decimal point, who knows?

GalCiv3 is not and will never be the kind of game I'd have designed. Founders will remember how early the Ship Designer came out - 0.3 was the Beta Number IIRC. Well, if it was up to me, espionage, diplomacy, politics and Citizens would have been the focus from Day 1 and you'd have to wait until the next expansion before you could design your fancy-schmancy ships. I suspect, however, that had I been Head Boss For Galactic Civilizations 3 I'd have been called into my boss's office pretty early on and advised to seek alternative employment because not enough folks had bought my game.

I'm cool with that - frogboy's mentioned 90%+ of players play the game at Easy level so he doesn't want to piss them off and fair enough. Those 90%+ probably prefer ship designing with the fancy parts and so on to spending turns and turns creating a war between Race A and Race B that you caused but they don't know that and even if they found out, Race D will smote them if they come anywhere near you... I live in hope that the next expansion really makes ideology more important than the "Get Pragmatic 1 for the 3 Constructors then jump down to Malevolent 1 for the Cruiser then up to Benevolent 1...etc" free-for-all that it offers at present but, hey, if it doesn't, it doesn't. I trust frogboy when he says "Ugh. I'm dying to tell you about what's coming in the next expansion pack! Some of you guys are going to loovvvve it I think." and I hope - not expect - that I'm one of those guys...

Stardock deserve serious respect because of the number of patches/DLCs/work they've put into the game. You could say "but they fixed something that shouldn't have been there to start with" and, okay, that's a fair point in some cases. But when you add in that some of those things - if not most - that Stardock have nerfed/improved/removed are extremely subjective, Stardock have done a hell of a lot of work.

I am dissapointed that Steam Reviews seem to have the power that frogboy says they have - it's going to get to the point where every developer have to impress one set of gamers which is a crap situation to be in. But if that's the way the gaming world is going, Stardock would be negligent to ignore that sad reality and point to reviews on Metacritic etc if it can be proven that those don't influence their income/support levels in the way that reviews on Steam can.

Since you are no longer going to do DLC

So what your saying is   I have to buy the next expansion to fix issues with the current game?

Yeah, that's going to happen...

Or mod, or get the latest review scores up.

Not having politics or client states is not a "bug".  If you don't want those features, then don't buy it.

Can you give us some crumbs on what Empire building entails?

Let's try this so perhaps the pricing concept will sink in to even the fanboys.

Ok, so company A (Stardock) sells a game for $40, sells some because their prior games didn't suck too bad (although Fallen Enchanterss sucked, IMO)  I purchase said game because I enjoyed a few of their previous games.  I get GC3, I play it a bit, it is so-so at best and I park it in my Steam library and go on to other things.  I revisit it in another 6-12 months, read up on the DLC's buy a few to see if it helps - it is still so-so and tedious.  I do back to play Stellaris and other stuff.  Another 6 months go by and you hear of Crusade, which is supposed to fix many of the issues that cause you not to play the game.  I am already down a fair chunk of change and don't really trust Stardock at this point.  So I wait for a sale because I sure am not going to pay full price again (fool me once stuff).  Anyway, a Steam sale comes up and low and behold I can buy Crusade for full price $20, or a new person can get the base game, all DLC's including Crusade for $20.  I am pissed.  Only when Stardock eventually - maybe another 6 months later does what all the other games do and prices the "bundle" based on prior purchases that the deal is acceptable.  This is a matter of principle, and I obviously learned an important lesson on never and I mean never buy a game until the reviews are good, the game has been out for a year or so.  Brad complaining about customers pissing and moaning about DLC pricing?  How about offering the existing loyal customers "bundle" pricing based on prior purchases as an ongoing thing rather than a last ditch effort.  Yes, this is a point of ethics and reasonableness and gouging loyal customers who would really like to support smaller developers but put up with this crap.  Brad's thinking on this matter will sink the ship....there are only so many fanboys who don't care about getting screwed.  And lest you think I am being unreasonable, if Stardock didn't throw a discounted emergency save the game sale to new customers I wouldn't be pissed.  This is what the fanboys miss, basic fairness.

What you are missing is that games, all games, go on sale eventually.

There is already a “complete my bundle” offering on the Steam.

There is no principle in your post, Purdy. Whether we are talking books, movies, games, etc. the longer they are out, the less they cost. New releases cost more.

Also, DLCs and expansions don’t “fix” anything. They add new content or new features. The base game has received over 2 years of free updates to fix bugs or improve AI or enhance UI, balance gameplay and even add lots of new features. You didn’t have to pay a cent for any of that.  But if you want new features and content then yes, you have to pay for it.

Also, consider this your final warning regarding personal attacks.  

Perhaps limit pop cap based on planet class? Terraforming raises the class, so that would be a natural way to also raise the pop cap. Farms mostly can focus on growth (maybe be treated as markets once max pop is reached?), while cities could be a generalist tile (vs factories and research labs as specialty tiles). Cities could grant a smaller % boost to all (like leaders), where the factories/labs/markets can give a higher boost, but to just their area of specialty.

That's an interesting potential solution actually.  In the original GalCiv your population was capped by the planet class.

I'm saddened by some of the goings-on here.  I will say that I will probably not pick up any expansions until Christmas 2018, but that is for personal reasons.  My 2018 is already spoken for--the whole flippin' year.  

Anyway, at the root of it, IMHO, is that the free fixes/patches, etc., have been incomplete.  Several on here would even be okay with a paid "fixes/rebalances" DLC, if one were available.  Some here would not be, but they are basically not okay with something that does not exist.  Galciv3's ideation has far outrun its implementation, and that I think is the source of a lot of frustration.  A DLC that fixes 90% of the issues is still better than a free patch that only fixes 10%.

I'm really new to this game (only have maybe 50 hours of play time)  but there are a few things I'd like to change. Or maybe these options already exist I just haven't figured out how to do them yet?

-Being able to jump to a colony on the map. I know you can zoom into the city but knowing where its located on map would be helpful. having the overview map center on a specific colony name would be useful.

-It would be nice to show the Race owner name when hovering over colonies, rather than just the banner, which can sometimes even be ambiguous.

-Being able to "repeat" build of missions like treasure hunt. It will save hundreds, maybe thousands of repetitive clicks per game

-being able to upgrade ships with unique items, rather than having to decommission them first.

 -An in-game knowledge base/help. There is no help or doc in the game. Please check out the Civilization games and see how they did that. Its extremely useful.

Thanks