A thought on the Talisman / Live on Pay-Per-View: Geo vs. Fyron

[Q]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
One hard code change I would like to see is the ability to turn off the tailsman at game setup without turning on the entire religous technology branch. That way you wouldn't need a mod to remove it from the game and still let people build the facilities.

Geoschmo

You don't need a hard code change or an entire mod. Just set the tech level requirement for the talisman to 10 and leave everything else as it is. Then you won't be able to get it.

[Loser]

Originally posted by Q:
You don't need a hard code change or an entire mod. Just set the tech level requirement for the talisman to 10 and leave everything else as it is. Then you won't be able to get it.

See, I think that's the kind of modding Geo was talking about avoiding.

[geoschmo]

Exactly right Loser. Q, I was suggesting a method to eliminate modding as a solution period. Of course your solution is very simple, but for the purposes of PBW play it would require something other than stock data files which is what I was trying to avoid. You can do it now by simply turning off the whole tech area, but some people think the economic facilities alone are enough of a reason to take the religious racial trait.

Geoschmo

[Loser]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
some people think the economic facilities alone are enough of a reason to take the religious racial trait.

Yeah. They rock.

Though if the Talisman were to be pulled, even those excellent facilities would not be worth the price one would pay for the whole Organic tech tree. (Mmmm... replicants... in tailer parks....)

[Taera]

no, i think the religious facilities are worth 1500 racial points on their own. and the talisman doesnt make sense. perharps maintenance-reducing components might do the religious comp trick?

[LGM]

You can certainly mod the Talisman to be weaker in some way. However, most games appear to use the base data files, which means the Talisman will dominate most games.

Gannging up on a Religious player does not work very well when 1/3 to 1/2 of the players are Religous. At least one of them will survive to get to the Talisman.

The relgious shrines are a nice help on the road to the Talisman. It is hard taking out systems that have pluses to damage and defense. The early game system bonuses give them a strong economy to defend with as they research to the Talisman.

How many widely played mods out there have a weakened form the the Talisman?

I created a Mod and made the Talisman act as 10KT armor so that it gets taken out right away without shields, or relatively soon if shields are stopping attacks. None of the players in that game took the Religious trait with that change. However, I also made some advanced traits cheaper so that lured them there.

At this point I will most likely only join games where the Mod reduces or eliminates the Talisman or Religous is turned off. I feel it is hard to design a race that is competitive with Religous without taking that trait. Organic races come close, but seekers are not a good counter as Point Defense can deal with them quite well. Ramming is hard gainst an enemy that hangs out at max range. Give the Religious player repulser beams and he will fling your ships away after he damges them, unless you use a bigger hull, which means you are to slow to catch them.

I have played a Religious race several times and really dominated and I have played against them several times and been really frustrated.

I think that Religious should be excluded from most PBW games until the base mode weakens the trait somehow.

[Slynky]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
Exactly right Loser. Q, I was suggesting a method to eliminate modding as a solution period. Of course your solution is very simple, but for the purposes of PBW play it would require something other than stock data files which is what I was trying to avoid. You can do it now by simply turning off the whole tech area, but some people think the economic facilities alone are enough of a reason to take the religious racial trait.

Geoschmo

I'm not sure I would. And, IMHO, a particularly offensive-prone player would lose a lot of the benefits by leaving his systems. Big deal with the event stuff---hardly anyone plays it in the games I've looked over. So, the best you are left with is added resource production if you lean toward an offensive game. (I'll confess I'm not a "student" or "expert" of the Religious trait, I've just played it a few times)

[ July 16, 2003, 19:18: Message edited by: Slynky ]