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  #1  
Old April 23rd, 2003, 09:53 PM
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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

Quote:
Originally posted by Loser:
I haven't modded, but the way I understand it, this should all be possible. All except the Neutrals part... I was under the impression you couldn't mod Neutrals.
You can mod neutrals. By deafault they have pure vanilla AI_General files. But you could set them up with whatever you want that is affordable in your mod. There is a bug that limits the number of neutrals in a game to 5 IIRC. Don't think that's ever been fixed. So if you want a game with a lot of primitive races you'll need to use regular AI spots. Might be preferable actually because a neutral Primitive that has been uplifted will still be limited to their own homesystem, while a regular AI is not.

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  #2  
Old April 23rd, 2003, 10:45 PM
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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

put copies of the normal tech high up the primitive tech tree? with a max of 20% of another races research, it might work. you'd also have to turn of mega evil.
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Old April 23rd, 2003, 11:27 PM

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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

You're right about Mega Evil, that would throw a real wrench in the gears. ("Damn you, little-bear-person! This does not go here!" "Yub yub!" "No, it doesn't.")

So, the only thing that is not open to alteration, concerning Neutrals, is their inability to leave the home system? Everything else can be changed?

And what about WPs? Can I gift WPs, will the AI know what to do with a transport full of WPs or will it jettison them and fill the transport with carrots for the winter?

The one place I see conflict in the real-tech vs. Primitive/Uplift-tech is Intel. Real players may be tempted to use Primitive/Uplift Intel. This should not be possible, as P/U Intel will probably need to work differently for the little bastards to make affordable use of it.

This can be solved by another layer of racial tech. Primitive-only Intel tech that requires Uplift Intel to get but costs little or nothing to research.

Also, do AI ever use Analyze on captured or traded ships?
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Old April 23rd, 2003, 11:36 PM
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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

Hey big dawg.
What's wrong with my proportions ?
I know I haven't been working out as much as I should lately, but.....

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  #5  
Old April 24th, 2003, 10:14 AM
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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

Quote:
I think the Primitives should have the capacity to produce some small amounts of Rads at some point, just so they can support a ship given to them by a player. "You gave a baseship to the Ewoks? Do you know what they're going to do with that thing?!"
Actually I was thinking about this Last night, and while I agree that they should get a small amount of rads, it would make more sense to have rad-free, giftable "basic" techs available to space-faring races. For example, if you gave a quantum engine to someone from the Vicorian era (think H.G.Well, Jules Verne) he would have no clue as to how it worked or how to operate or maintain it. However, although he probably couldn't design and build a working rocketship of his own, he could ( given a little training) probably operate, understand and maintain one at a basic level if you built it for him. He might even be able to manufacture a few spares for it. So you could have a set of "rocket engines" and so on that are available to normal races, but aren't particularly useful (because they are slow, inefficient) except as gifts to primitives. They would be perfect for primitives, who can maintain them easily because they don't use rads. Also, it means the primitives could maintain it but not repair it- or at least, they wouldn't be able to repair the engines, although they could probably fix the crew quarters or bridge if necesasary. This would instill a real sense of entropy in the primitives when trying to uplift them to far, too fast.

Of course you could just gift 100000 rads along with the ship...

Quote:
The Primitives should have superior infantry and, if possible, militia to start. This is both to keep them from being easy prey (human vs. AI, after all), and to account for the fact that they probably still kill their own food.
This is also a good point. I'm not sure about superior infantry, but they probably ought to be about equivalent. It's worth remembering that they will be completely unable to build anything other than infantry for the first X turns (until they get uplifted). This means that while their infantry might be weak, they will have one hell of a lot of it=-)

Quote:
Since the Primitives are not only AI, but dumbed-down and limited AI, plaguing them out of existence would be too easy. I feel that these races should have plague resistance, of some sort, from the get go. This could be said to reflect their hardier, already survival-of-the-fittest lifestyle.
Also very true. I like the survival of the fittest idea. I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, you don't want them to be too vulnerable. On the other, realistically they would be very vulnerable. Also, although it's easy to destroy them, they would pose so little threat that most (human) players just wouldn't bother. Maybe put plague prevention 2 on their cultural centres, and allow them to upgrade to 3 or 4 after uplift. The only trouble with this is that human players would find a way to exploit this "free" plague-prevention tech.
Finally, since half the racial point selections are irrelevant to them, they would all probably have very high reproduction and happiness traits, which (I think) would go some way to countering the effect of plagues.

Quote:
You could do all:

Dirt Races
Steam Races
Space Races

But each would require their own Racial Tech tree, to keep them separate.
Yeah, this would be cool. Especially the steam races, the more I think about that the more I love it. The other great thing is that because of their limited selection of units and ships, you could make shipsets for them very very easily: a few infantry pics, a race pic, a couple of AI files (Build infantry, build more infantry, yubyub) and that would be it.

Quote:
Or perhaps the Dirt Races could move up to Space Races.
Not sure about the progression, unless it was *really* slow (ie five hundred turns or more to progress)

Quote:
You can mod neutrals.
Excellent (rubs hands together, in a Mr Burns style)

Quote:
("Damn you, little-bear-person! This does not go here!" "Yub yub!" "No, it doesn't.")
LOL!

Quote:
And what about WPs? Can I gift WPs, will the AI know what to do with a transport full of WPs or will it jettison them and fill the transport with carrots for the winter?
Not sure about this. What it will probably do is unload/ jetisson the WPs, fill the transport with ewok warriors and catapults and go invade someone.

Quote:
The one place I see conflict in the real-tech vs. Primitive/Uplift-tech is Intel. Real players may be tempted to use Primitive/Uplift Intel. This should not be possible, as P/U Intel will probably need to work differently for the little bastards to make affordable use of it.
Just make it less effective or more costly than the real thing, then real players will have no reason to use it.

Quote:
This can be solved by another layer of racial tech. Primitive-only Intel tech that requires Uplift Intel to get but costs little or nothing to research.
Or do your idea, that works too.

Quote:
Also, do AI ever use Analyze on captured or traded ships?
No, never.

Quote:
Hey big dawg.
What's wrong with my proportions ?
I know I haven't been working out as much as I should lately, but.....
Sorry P, but there are some proportions that just can't be improved by working out
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  #6  
Old April 24th, 2003, 05:58 PM

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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
...they should get a small amount of rads, it would make more sense to have rad-free, giftable "basic" techs available to space-faring races. ... you could have a set of "rocket engines" and so on that are available to normal races, but aren't particularly useful (because they are slow, inefficient) except as gifts to primitives. They would be perfect for primitives, who can maintain them easily because they don't use rads. Also, it means the primitives could maintain it but not repair it- or at least, they wouldn't be able to repair the engines, although they could probably fix the crew quarters or bridge if necesasary.
This idea I like, but there is something I do not understand: I thought both maintainance and repair costs were determined by the original cost of the component. If this is true, than anything the Primative can maintain, he can also repair. Anything he cannot repair, he cannot maintain.

Please correct me if I am wrong.
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
Of course you could just gift 100000 rads along with the ship...
This solution of yours, I think, is the better solution.

"I have something for the glorious nation of little-bear-people. Here is a ship, it comes with instructions for how to run it."

"Yub yub!"

"Here are some appropriately packaged radioactive elements, you will need these to run this ship."

"Det luktar flingor har."

"No, do not open the package. Do not use the contents of the package as condiments. Do not use these resources in any way other than as you are directed by the instructions. Hey you! Put that down!"
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
I'm not sure about superior infantry, but they probably ought to be about equivalent. It's worth remembering that they will be completely unable to build anything other than infantry for the first X turns (until they get uplifted)... (Build infantry, build more infantry, yubyub)
You are absolutely right here. No real need to buff the Primitive Infantry, as there will be more than enough of it.
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
Also, although it's easy to destroy them, they would pose so little threat that most (human) players just wouldn't bother. Maybe put plague prevention 2 on their cultural centres, and allow them to upgrade to 3 or 4 after uplift. The only trouble with this is that human players would find a way to exploit this "free" plague-prevention tech.
Finally, since half the racial point selections are irrelevant to them, they would all probably have very high reproduction and happiness traits, which (I think) would go some way to countering the effect of plagues.
I think there are many reasons to plague them. They have a homeworld full of facilities. Once the population is wiped out there is no militia to deal with, making an invasion that much simpler. And even if you can only fit 400,000,000 of your own people on their world; it will keep its full complement of facilities. Even if they're junky facilities, it is well worth the trouble, in almost any circumstance. After all, another player can pull your friends away from you behind your back, but to take a planet form you, he will need to deal with your face... or something.

To resolve this, I think it would be appropriate to either make them invulnerable to all plagues, or to give them, as you recommended, level 2 or so in plague resistance and make plagues harder to research. No a whole lot harder, but some. As powerful as it is, plague is pretty easy to get a hold of in a normal game, I do not know how it is in Proportions.

Additionally, the anti-plague tech can be made Primitive only, then players could not get it.

You are very right about it being more realistic to leave the Primitives vulnerable to plague: see Battlefield Earth (or rather don't see it, it was poor, and don't read the book either, it's just a Parable of Scientology so just forget about it).

Or you could just leave them vulnerable to plagues and see how unbalancing it makes the game to leave this simple exploit open to players. I think leaving Primitives in such a manner would eliminate from them any possibility of adding something to the game, but I do not know.
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
*some stuff about Dirt, Steam, and Space races*
The way I see it, Dirt Races would produce almost no resources; maybe just the slim Mineral and Organic they need to make infantry, and almost nothing more. If you want to give a Dirt Race a ship, you will need to give them enough resources to keep it running for a while, that's a whole lot of all three resources.

I'm assuming these are not Neutral Races, only because I find great amusement in letting the little buggers out of their starting system. Dirt Race combat AI would center around loading up infantry in any ship you give them, heading for the nearest inhabited planet, and invading.

"Oh great, the Ewoks just turned on me."

"What? How bad can that be? They're just Ewoks."

"I gave them a couple of transport ship with WPs. Those transport ship had shields."

"So."

"I take it you've never faced invasion by thousands of teddy bears with guns... I never should have Uplifted them."

Dirt races get no ability to research, and have no tech tree to climb. They are completely dependant on benevolent Uplift

Out off all the things usful to a player, Dirt Races would probably only get Resupply upgrade to one of their facilities.

Steam Races would have Infantry units highly superior to those made by Dirt Races. They would have the ability to produce large amounts of Minerals, Organics, and maybe a little bit of Radioactives. This would mostly be useful only for trade, unlike Dirt Races who aren't much good for even that, but they will be building things.

Steam Races should have the ability to Research a little bit. Just enough to slowly move up their own tree. Mostly the results would be seen in Infantry and Armor, with a few upgrades to their facilities available. In the long run, Steam Races will have capabilities much like those humans currently have, with petty WPs that fire sad little missiles and perhaps the capacity to mine their own sector. They might, topping out their tree, even be able to build a few extraordinarily expensive fighters. But they never get a shipyard, or drones.

Steam Races will be easier to Uplift than Dirt Races. Then they can get upgrades that add the Repair ability at one of their facilities, among other things.

Space Races will have Infantry, Armor, and rather pitiful fighters at, or very near, their beginning. They can produce Radioactive resources, but not as well as a Real race. They will start with the petty WPs and sad little missiles that Steam Races end up with, and can get better, maybe even some ineffective Direct-Fire weapons.

As Space Races advance, they will gain the ability to produce better, cheaper fighters, better weapons, and maybe even a tiny little space station. They may get drones. At their top, Space Races will get Escorts, Colony ships (yes, they _can_ expand) and, if they're lucky, mine layers.

Both races that are capable of research can get better Versions of their own techs through Uplift. And, based off Uplifted techs, can research even better Versions. Perhaps that would be where Steam Races get Fighters and Space Races get Colony ships (let them start with Colonizing components, just don't give them a ship large enough to fit it).

It should be a trade off, probably for something the Real Race really wants the Steam or Space Race to have. Something like: you Uplift them the Resupply Depot upgrade they will, from that tech, research all kinds of things.

That's how I see it, anyway.
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
quote:
You can mod neutrals.
Excellent (rubs hands together, in a Mr Burns style)
Yeah, but why? The only difference to Neutrals is they all use the same file set, and they cannot leave their system. Neutrals, as I understand it, are not extra players. Even with Neutrals you cannot go over 20 players.
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
What it will probably do is ... fill the transport with ewok warriors and catapults and go invade someone.
That, at least, would be the plan. Go 'Woks!
Quote:
Originally posted by dogscoff:
Just make it less effective or more costly than the real thing, then real players will have no reason to use it.
Cost is such a funny issue with Intel, is some ways it actually makes it better. I think it would actually be better for Primitive Intel to cost less.

But, as you said, the layered approach works too.

If no one else bites, one of us may have to take up modding, Dogscoff. This sounds way to amusing.
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  #7  
Old April 24th, 2003, 06:21 PM

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Default Re: Primitives for proportions?

"This idea I like, but there is something I do not understand: I thought both maintainance and repair costs were determined by the original cost of the component. If this is true, than anything the Primative can maintain, he can also repair. Anything he cannot repair, he cannot maintain."

Repair is free- but if you can't build the component, you can't fix it either.

EDIT: and maintance is just a flat percentage applied to the cost of the ship, total. Doesn't matter if you could build it or not.

[ April 24, 2003, 17:21: Message edited by: Phoenix-D ]
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