Modder brainstorming session

[Nitram Draw]

You would definately have to make choices. Since the bonus moves on the standard engines require you to use all of the same type of engines the choices could get hard.
I think it will need a lot of tuning though or else we could have ships with 15 tactical moves or 25 strategic moves.
Now if MM would only expand on the AI ship building routine to allow specific types of ships to be built and add the Fleet composition file someone suggested we could have a really deadly AI!

[dogscoff]

Space is big,
Space is dark,
It's hard to find,
A place to park.

While the above statement is undeniably true,
The universe currently simulated by Space Empires is very small and crowded. Within a few dozen turns, most systems have been colonised and explored, and all the empires are sitting in each others' laps.

How about a mod which creates a more "empty" universe? A universe where meeting another empire does not mean you will be squabbling over one another's home systems within a year. I'm thinking more Alien than Star Wars, more Red Dwarf than Trek, more Dark Star than Bab5.

Here's an idea of how to go about it:

First, the map generator files would have to be modded to make colonisable planets/ systems rarer and farther apart. This would increase their value and force players to look beyond their home systems.
Huge maps with fewer empires would also help.

Now, make colony ships and components far bigger and more expensive. I'm thinking maybe 800-1000 kt, with a 700-900 kt colony component and harsh combat modifiers.

Cargo components for smaller ships should be of limited use, forcing players to use large ships for any serious cargo movment. Adjust supply usage/ storage so that long range travel is really expensive for large ships. Different engines for different ship sizes maybe. (This could fit in nicely with that combat/game movement suggestion a few Posts down.)

Setting up a new colony would now be a *major* investment (and hence a *major* risk)- especially in another system.

New colonies would also be much more vulnerable. This is good, after all it's a long way home. Facilities should take longer to build, so that a new colony does not establish itself and become independent of external defence/ support too quickly.
Each player might only have a few dozen colonies throughout the entire game.

The supply restrictions on bigger ships and cargo restrictions on smaller ones would limit the expansion of infrastructure, so
military domination would then revolve around the strategic placement of fleets, mines, sats, space stations and colonies rather than simply racing to develop the bigger production base and throw ships at the enemy.

Fleets of small ships would be able to roam from system to system and rule over frontier space. However they would be more or less powerless against the defences of established systems. Attacking an enemy system would be an enormous projct.


Remote mining would play a greater role, as would moons, storms and nebulae. Physical warfare would become the Last resort when diplomacy and intel fail, although having good defences around your home systems would be more important than ever.

Some of S_J's mods (ie hardened bulkheads, cheap/ quality mounts) would make good additions since they make ships more individual. Phoenix-D's primitives (still in development, I believe) would also be good here, since their isolation would give them more bargaining power and more effective defences.

It would make for a much slower and more deliberate game, since ships and planets would no longer be "throwaway" items. Combat would be rarer but when it happened it would be truly epic, with loads of allied empires in gigantic battles.

I don't know how the AI would cope with all this but it would be cool for human players - a whole new game with a whole new feel.

Thoughts?

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"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Uh, I think so, Brain, but balancing a family and a career ... oooh, it's all too much for me. "

[Nitram Draw]

Nice idea. I think the AI would have a tough time handling it though. I tried a few games with colonize home planet type and atmosphere restrictions, this is as close as you can get to the few and far between colonizable planets now. The AI did not fare so well.
Making colonies more expensive is a good idea, they are basically throwaways as you put it. If you only have 10 each becomes much more valuable. Again, I think the AI would have trouble with fewer colonies and it isn't very efficient in picking colony types but in a game with human opponents it should work real well.
If the number of systems limit is lifted I don't see why most of your ideas cannot be used.

[geoschmo]

Nitpick alert...Nitpick alert...

quote:

---

Originally posted by Puke:
Just like when we thought the U2 and later the SR71 were too high and fast to catch, but they got their clocks cleaned by super-sonic short-range mig interceptors!

---

Sorry Puke, the SR71 has never been caught by anything, and the U-2 wasn't cought by another aircraft. Gary Powers was shot down when the Soviet Air Defense sent up a BUNCH of surface to air missles. One managed to get close enough that when it exlploded it damaged his plane. (Of course the shotgun approach also knocked out at least one of the MIGS persuing him as well.)

Doesn't affect the point you were making. I just felt like being picky.
Geo

[dogscoff]

>I think the AI would have a >tough time handling it though.

That's what I thought. Economically it wouldn't be much different to the Neutrals, and the slower pace might help to hide some of the AI's research and design eccentricities. I think the main difficulty would be persuading it to defend its colonies adequately.


>This is as close as you can get to the few >and far between colonizable planets now.
...
>If the number of systems limit is lifted I >don't see why most of your ideas cannot be >used.

Number of systems limit? OIC... well I think 255 systems might be enough. After all, if you had (say) 10 players and a few neutrals/ primitives, that's still >25 systems each. Maybe you could have a few colonisable worlds every 4th or 5th system... that would be about a dozen worlds per empire before they had to start squabbling=-)

The map could be implemented by adjusting the systmtypes.txt file couldn't it? If not, maybe the map editor...

------------------
"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Uh, I think so, Brain, but balancing a family and a career ... oooh, it's all too much for me. "

[Nitram Draw]

I was thinking if the system limit was increased you could really get that "are we alone" feeling. Even with 255 systems I generally run into someone within 30-60 turns. What if you went 100's of turns before finding another race?

[capnq]

Like a lot of people, I dislike the way Phased Shields I are so much less effective than normal Shields V. Most of the ideas I've seen to fix this seem to involve rearranging the progression to make them alternate, e.g. normal I, phased I, normal II, phased II, but I don't like that, either. It seems to me that phased should be a major breakthrough that make normal shields obsolete.

I haven't tested this idea yet, but I think a better fix would be to make phased I equivalent to normal V, then increase from there. This has the advantage that you don't have to rewrite the AI research files for a new progression.

My current idea for the progression would be something like this:

Level shield pts. minerals radioactives
normal V 300 500 0 (no change)
phased I 300 450 50
phased II 375 500 100
phased III 450 550 150
phased IV 525 600 200
phased V 600 650 250

Do these numbers look reasonable?

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Cap'n Q

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the
human mind to correlate all of its contents. We live on a placid
island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was
not meant that we should go far. -- HP Lovecraft