The ticks in Cosmic Supremacy are 1-3 hours long (depending on the Galaxy). However, the game does not start until a predetermined time, the countdown to which can be seen in the lower right corner of the main window. This start may be postponed if the galaxy is not full by that time.
Cosmic Supremacy is a game that runs day and night, also when you are not online, for instance while you are asleep or are at work. Each turn lasts for a certain amount of real world time. For example, in a “1 hour turn game” the clock ticks down in real time, and when an hour has passed, that turn ends, the results are calculated, and the clock starts ticking down for the next turn. This is all done automatically, and happens whether you are in the game or not.
A Sandbox Galaxy “ticks” every 15 minutes, that means there are 4 turns per hour. So, while you are asleep you are not in control of the game for 32 ticks (presuming you sleep 8 hours) - that’s a lot. During these 32 turns a lot can happen, you could get attacked and lose half your empire before you even notice it. Since a Sandbox Galaxy is only there for testing and getting acquainted to the game, that is acceptable. However, in regular galaxies, where you try to play competitively and try to earn galaxy fame, not being in control of the game for dozens of turns is not an option. That’s why tick times are usually 1 hour, so you only “lose” 8 ticks during those night sleeps or office hours. By using Governors and Admirals you can bridge that time (and more) pretty well.
Once you have played the game a little more and actually had your first conflicts with other empires behind you, you will understand why tick times of 1 hour (or even slower than that) are pretty ideal.
Having said that, there is one variant of the game that caters to the needs of those “real-time” players among you: so-called “Speed Galaxies” have very fast tick times between 1 to 3 minutes. At those speeds the game really feels like a real-time strategy game. They are a lot of fun because all the action of an entire game is packed into one weekend. Speed Galaxies usually run 2 x 6 hours on Saturdays and Sundays, with frequent short breaks in between. They are ideal for players that can afford to spend a weekend playing a game, instead of persistently playing a game for roughly 4 weeks.
The game ends as soon as a clear victor can be determined. This is done automatically by analyzing the scores of the players. The code will then automatically set an end-turn at which point the galaxy is declared over, and fame-points are rewarded according to the amount of score every player has earned.
A player can influence this process, by ticking the “Vote to End the Galaxy” box in the Overview Screen. This way you can force the code to pick an end-turn even earlier than that. A player should tick this box roughly 100 turns before he thinks the galaxy should end.
When entering the galaxy you could change the connection settings and tick “I am behind a firewall” (even if you are not). This will use a different connection method altogether, which is a little bit slower but should be a lot more reliable.
Cosmic Supremacy uses your 3D chip to draw some of the graphics on screen, in particular the Galaxy Map, but also the Space View box in the Planet View Screen. Some very old 3D chips might not support some of the features that are required to draw 3D correctly, or its drivers are too old to support the required features correctly.
Your only chance here is trying to download the latest drivers for your graphics card/chip, just like you would in order to get any other 3D game to run and display correctly on your computer.
To do so find out what 3D chip is stuck in your computer. There are many ways to do so, but one is to run a little tool named “DxDiag.exe”, which comes as part of your DirectX installation. In the “Start” menu click “Run...”, this prompts you for the name of the program that you want to run. Type “dxdiag” and press enter. A window pops up collecting all sorts of information about your hardware. Click the “Display” tab. Under “Chip-Type” it lists the name of your 3D chip. Under “Manufacturer” it lists the maker of that chip. Find their webpage and head for the “Drivers” section. Download and install that driver.
While you are at it, also make sure that you have the latest version of DirectX installed, which you can find here:
Another cause for graphical glitches of all sorts could be any 3rd party software that enhances the visuals of Windows, like for instance “WindowBlinds“. Disable that software and see if this makes any difference.
This is most likely caused by some firewall or virus software blocking the connection. In some cases a virus software may think that since the .exe has changed (because of the patch) that this can only be caused by a virus infection, and hence blocks access. So disable the virus and/or firewall software to find out if that is indeed the case.
In order to fix this problem try to re-install Cosmic Supremacy from scratch.
If your client keeps failing to apply the patch, you can avoid the patching process altogether by downloading the latest version of the client. Every time a new patch is provided, the downloadable client on the download page is updated as well.
Uninstall your current version of the client, download the latest version and install it. You should now be able to enter your galaxy without the need to apply a patch.
A player earns Rank 1 if the total fame points earned in all played galaxies exceeds 15 points. A player will never lose his Player Rank.
However, once the average fame over all played galaxies drops below 15, a player is allowed to sign up to unranked galaxies again. This can happen if he performed badly in recent galaxies - for instance because he stopped playing in the middle of the game, or he was defeated early in the game.
Please note that still running galaxies, and Team- and Experimental Galaxies are not counted towards fame calculation.
You need to find the closest Sun to your home system. Cosmic Supremacy offers a tool named the “Radar” that determines distances in 3 dimensional space. It basically works like this: You specify an object (a sun, planet or ship) that acts as the “center of the radar”, that’s the point from which distances are measured. In your case you would select your colony ship, because you want to find out what’s the closest sun to that ship.
In the “Radar Control Window” you would select that you only want to measure distances to Suns. On the right (”Radar Marks”) it should list all suns that are within the specified range (which you can change with the slider). The suns are ordered by distance, closest one is listed first.
Now the important bit is that your own sun is listed as well, after all that is a sun too, and it clearly is the closest to your colony ship - which is probably still in orbit of your home planet. The task however is to send to the closest neighboring sun to your home system. That’s what the “Unexplored Systems” tickbox is for. If you tick that, your own sun is removed from that list (since it is already “explored”).
Next, the Tutorial tries to teach you that not only can you send ships to planets or suns anywhere in the galaxy map (which means the planet or sun needs to be visible in the galaxy, which often requires rotating or zooming the galaxy map), but you can also directly pick the target from the Radar Marks list!
To do so, order the ship to “Move to”, now the mouse pointer will change (as usual) - but now instead of clicking a planet or sun in the galaxy, click the top most entry on the Radar Marks list, which is after all your closest neighbouring star...
Sometimes it is required to change the size of the galaxy after it has been opened for Sign-Up, to either grow or shrink it.
Re-shuffling means that the structure and layout of the galaxy is re-created, and the players will be assigned a new home-planet/system in there. That new spot could be better or worse (or the same) than what the player has currently got (it’s all random).
The player needs to give fresh ship- and planet-orders, and set the research goal again. However, Governors, Admirals, Ship-Designs or Shared (named) Production Queues will not be lost during this process.
Well, the truth of the matter is it was mostly done by Erwin, with the occasional help of his friends and Cosmic Supremacy users. There are also some who insist that Erwin is really a pseudonym for a giant underground organization of uber-programmers, who are being assisted by aliens and the Templar Knights. After all, it’s too good to be made by just one guy, right?
faq.txt · Last modified: 2014/08/17 12:45 by tingling
