[mvstang]

First time here, so I haven't had a chance to read through the 40 some pages of responses yet, so my one thought has probably come up already, but here it is. It's a little long read, since I tend to ramble and get down into a lot of detail, so bear with me.

The one big thing I'd like to see is crew/governors/characters within the game. There are a few parts of implementing this that would be rather easy, and also make it easily mod-able, and a few parts that might be a little more complicated.

Since the game data is mostly based on txt files, which I think is great, you start with a text file that defines characters and or character types. Either every character would then have a skill level in all applicable areas (explained in a bit), or create types of characters, such as political, ground troops and space troops, who only have skills in the areas within their type. Political skills could things like increase/decrease production amounts, building speeds, research and intelligence bonuses and planet happiness modifiers. Ground commanders would be rather simple for bonuses to combat, space would be a little more detailed. Bonuses to ship travel speed, ship combat speed, damage, maintenance costs, supply costs and repair speeds for example. All should have some sort of loyalty and morale levels. Skills should probably start at 100 for no effect, that way you could have characters with less than 100 to have them be a detractor, but they might have high skills in other areas to make up for it.

Then make a text file that defines various positions, such as ship captain, planetary/system governor, ship engineer, ship navigator, ship combat officer, mineral plant supervisor, etc. Each position then has fields for the abilities from the abilities text file that apply. For example, a mineral plant supervisor position would have it's Value1 as Resource Gen Modifier Planet - Minerals. When that position is occupied, then the amount of minerals generated by that planet would be increased by the skill of the character. Ship Engineer could have many applications, repair time, added propulsion, reduced supply costs for movement and reduced maintenance on the ship for example. Ship captains could increase the effect of all other crew in the ship based on a leadership skill. Admirals could increase the effect of all captains within an entire fleet.

To implement this to the ships and planets, there are two methods. Add a line at the end of each planet size and vehicle size of Number of Crew types, simliar to number of abilities, for example 4. Then you'd have 4 triples of lines that would describe which position it is, how many of that position are allowed (max), and how many of that position are required (min). Perhaps also the skill and minimum level required for holding that position. For example on an escort:

Number of Crew:= 4
Crew 1 Type := Captain
Crew 1 Descr := Description
Crew 1 Val 1 := 1
Crew 1 Val 2 := 1
Crew 1 Val 3 := Leadership
Crew 1 Val 4 := 50
Crew 2 Type := Navigator
Crew 2 Descr := Description
Crew 2 Val 1 := 1
Crew 2 Val 2 := 1
Crew 2 Val 3 := Ship Piloting (as opposed to fighter piloting)
Crew 2 Val 4 := 50
Crew 3 Type := Engineer
Crew 3 Descr := Description
Crew 3 Val 1 := 1
Crew 3 Val 2 := 0
Crew 3 Val 3 := Engineering
Crew 3 Val 4 := 75
Crew 4 Type := Crew
Crew 4 Descr := Description
Crew 4 Val 1 := 50
Crew 4 Val 2 := 5
Crew 4 Val 3 := Ship Crewing
Crew 4 Val 4 := 25

This could then be expanded as ships grow so that a Dreadnought could require a captain with a leadership skill of 120, and perhaps dozens of crew types to fill with crews in the thousands.

The other option to applying this to planets and ships themselves is to put these lines within components and facilites instead. For example, a Bridge could require a captain and a navigator, while a research center could have 1 position available for a research scientist, but not required. This is probably the more versatile option of the two, since positions would only be required for running the various components of a ship you decide to put on them.

The one big problem with this is it can get very complicated and overwhelming very fast for larger ships, but you could always mod it higher for more complexity, or mod it lower for less, by removing all requirements except a captain for example.

Facilities like Academies and the Ship and Fleet Training sites could either train current characters to a certain level over time, or a higher Academy level could create a better default character on average at creation, which is something I haven't figured out how it should happen yet (character creation that is)

Whew, long rambling idea, that's most of how far I've thought it out at this point. Putting in a basic character system might not be too hard to do, but I wouldn't know, and something like the above idea would allow those of us who like it more complex to mod to our hearts content to make it more detailed.

Thoughts?