Ok, well I finally found the original thread.
http://www.shrapnelgames.com/cgi-bin...;f=23;t=005791
I think maybe I have missed the point with my Posts here. I was leaving out the factor of the scarcity of minerals. Is that to be a huge factor? That would require some modding to acomplsh, but not a tremendous amount. The settings.txt file contains the values for planets. You could very easily tweak that and then all planets would be scarce in minerals. Then simply make the resource converter a racial tech that only the TF has access to, and suddenly they control the means of production.
With my suggestions the TF would have what to offer? I guess later in the game it would be a source of technology. It could also be good for fast acquisition of funds or ships in case a war breaks out. Repayable at with interest of course. And a method of disposal for ships that are damaged, depleted and out of range of assistance. That would require time for TF to get it's infrastructure in place though.
They could also construct and sell various racial technology ships and planets that players may consider valuable.
And without modifying the resource model that does leave being hostile to the TF as an option. In the original idea that would be economic suicide as you could not build or support any ships without the minerals provided by the TF.
Geoschmo
[ June 11, 2002, 17:34: Message edited by: geoschmo ]