Premise
While reading Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy a while ago, I was struck with an idea for a mod. And so Ad Astras arose. This mod is based not around battle tactics, but around long-term strategy: yes, of course your tactics are vital, but nowhere near as important as they are in many mods. Resource management, tech choices, unit production...these are your main areas of focus.

The mod is set in the distant future, when the Empire of Sol has collapsed, leaving the areas of the galaxy under the control of local governments. You take the role of ruler of one of these rising stars and must lead your armada to victory.

Gameplay
Mineral desposits are silly; we're talking about colonizing entire planets for expansions. Yes, that's right. Planets. You start with an outpost, a couple workers, and a couple scout ships, and build your way up to a galactic empire. Although there are technically around 40 different units (only one race, though), the mainstream military units fall into only seven different types, with most of the remainder consisting of upgrades to them. Because, seriously, if you've just found a new kind of weapon, your ships aren't all spontaneously going to all suddenly have it equipped, and retrofitting is is pretty hard with spacesihps. So if you want that Firefly to have extra firepower, you'll need to build it in from the start.

Closely related to this is the tech tree. Instead of the normal building/unit progression, all buildings and units are dependent on your tech level in three fields: Engineering, Weaponry, and Piloting. A Firefly fighter requires nothing, but a Firefly with upgraded weapons requires Weaponry Level 1. And so on. These techs are pretty darn expensive, though, so choose wisely...

Other features
Well, since there's only one race, the aspect of player control has to enter into the equation somewhere, right? Which is the rationale behind the Sanction system.

At the beginning of the game, you start with 2 Sanction Points, which you can spend on any of 10 one-level upgrades which do all sorts of things, mostly in the way of unit construction. One, for instance, lets you build heavy siege ships, another allows the construction of a money-giving building, and a third gives a certain ship an uber-planet-killer-laser-storm-of-death. There's a total of 45 possible combinations, so go crazy

Oh, yeah, by the way, space is big. Really big. And I'm trying to give some idea--not an accurate one, but a general impression--of how big space really is, that is to say "really big." This means that it takes a long time for units to get anywhere--another reason why strategy has a bigger effect that tactics.

Oh, did I mention that it can only be played on special maps? "Oh no!" I hear you cry, "Whatever shall we do?" Not to fear, for 25 such maps--count 'em--are packaged with the mod. I make no guarantees as to balance and such issues, but they look pretty well-balanced to me.

RELEASE 1.5
-(Unit Changes)-
Defense Platforms, Laser Batteries, Ion Cannons, and Vanguards now require 4 supply each.
Militia Fighters now require 1 supply each.
Pulse Singularities now require 20 supply.
Pulse Singularities now deal damage in one blast instead of radiating beams.
Reduced Draconis HP by 40.
Croniades attack now deals damage to target instead of having Stasis effect.
Tyrant-line ships are now built from Project Development.
The Vanguard no longer has the lift-off ability.
Vanguard cost decreased to 750 material.
-(Gameplay)-
Added Lamia line.
Planetary resources are now awarded on a diminishing-returns system.
-(Bug Fixes)-
Corrected the Command Platform (Arming)'s portrait.
Corrected the sounds for the Arming Command Platform and Eleint.
Fixed a kill-score bug.
Fixed a unit size bug.
Fixed a bug in which buttons would not disappear correctly from lifted-off Vanguards.
-(Miscellany)-
Updated readme.
-(Status unknown)-
Possibly fixed a bug causing units to become unselectable

Croniades attack now deals damage to target instead of having Stasis effect.

I love this mod and it's easily one of my all time favorites just because of it's uniqueness. It's nice to see you still refining it. The Video is entertaining and the end fight scene is a good one. yeah, it may be a bit long overall, but I like it.

* Vanguards not being able to lift off really is disappointing, but I guess there was no other solution. We have a replay of ShadowyMoon rushing with these and demonstrates just how awesome they are as a mobile unit.. but that's how it goes.

* Supply required for defensive structures? I actually love it. Ppl will really have to juggle the pros and cons of creating a static defensive at the price of mobility. .. but I wonder how the Corbo turtling fans feels tho?

* Diminishing returns on the planet resources sounds interesting and will be interested to see how this effects gameplay. You've always been really keen on balance as your mentor Hercanic always preached as well, so I'm sure this was well thought out.

* One bug to report that i'm sure you are aware of but I didn't see addressed:
With the arrival of additional outposts, some of these will mysteriously lack psi? and no buildings can be placed around them as a result. very odd. Any idea what causes this?

sidenotes/questions:
You had some interesting background storylines posted somewhere.. any chance of making a small campaign?

Also, Is this really the end to your modding? You have no other mod spinning in the back of your head... just crying to be made? I find that hard to believe. Artists can't just stop creating cold turkey. can they?

Bug: Vanguards can't attack?

give all players 3k to start as opposed to the 2k + 1k outpost bonus
after 30 seconds set a switch that ativates the outpost bonus.
all subsequent rounds the player then receives the usual 1k per outpost etc.

That's why I did it--I don't like people turtling.