Multi stage game

[Makhil]

Searching for a way to keep people interested for a 3 month game, i came up with the following idea : multi stage game. Let me explain.

Stage 1 - gal level : During the first 2 weeks, planets can only interact within their own galaxy. They can research, build, initiate roids, attack and def ingal, cov ops. The aim of this stage is to become the gal ruler (actual GC). At the end of the 2 weeks, the planet with the highest score becomes GC, all planets votes are set on the winner (and can't be changed for 72 ticks). The GC picks his ministers. The gal fund is created, trade is enabled. The MoD can initiate the Cluster propulsion research (resources are taken from the gal fund). The next stage can begin.

Stage 2 - Cluster level : During the following 4 weeks, galaxies will fight to become the Lord Gal of the cluster. The GC and MoC can start an alliance treaty and propose it to other gals to sign (or force them to). To join a treaty, both the GC and MoC need to accept it. Gals can't attack in ally. When a gal chooses to join an alliance, it becomes the subject (vassal) of the gal who initiated the treaty (this gal becomes the Lord gal). A Lord gal receives a percentage of its subject gals ressources. Gals within an alliance get a -1 eta bonus. At the end of the 4 weeks, the Alliance with the more subjects becomes the cluster Empire. All the other alliances of the cluster are merged with it and can't quit it for the next 72 ticks. To quit a treaty both the GC and the MoW need to break it. To quit the Empire the GC and his 3 ministers votes are needed.
When the Empire is proclaimed all the gals with no ally become renegade gals, the gals quitting the Empire will also become renegades. The GC of the Lord Gal becomes Imperator.
The MoD (Chancellor) of the Lord gal can research Universe propulsion, taking an amount of resources in the gal funds of the Empire.
An Empire can be put down if a majority of its subject gals quit it to form a new ally.

Stage 3 - Universe level : From now on, Empires will fight off to expand by :
-merging with other empires (in this case the biggest Empire keeps its name and Imperator). To merge an Empire with another the GC and the Ministers on both sides must accept it.
- attracting (or forcing) renegades gals. A gal losing a certain amount of score/roids in a battle will automatically join the Empire attacking it (it will be put under the Empire protection for the next 72 ticks, meaning it can't be attacked and can't quit the Empire, but it can send def).

In this game, alliances will work on gal level, thus giving a chance for everyone (including newbies) to be part of an ally. Alliances would be created in game (not beforehand) but in Stage 3, Galaxies would have the possibility to quit them and try to reform the alliances we know today (would it be worth it ?).
Of course there would still be a planet ranking.

how bad is that ?

[Chax]

I'd love playing a game like this.

[Killerbij]

I'd get rid of the first stage: attacking your galaxy is just foolish because it will ruin any chance you have in stages 2 and 3. People sure as hell won't get you defense if you ruined their chance at a succesfull ranking early on. (Instead of making people play 2 or 3 months they'll quit after stage 1) The only way to prevent this is to reset planets at the end of a stage (maybe not to a null-level but to a higher level)

Stage 2 has some major disadvantages as well: big gals will only get bigger especially with a Lord gal receiving a percentage of its subject gals resources. I DO like making cluster alliances a part of the game however. Being unable to attack a galaxy your MOC and GC agreed to nap should provide some interesting politics. I don't see the point of having cluster funds and lord gals though. IMHO it will only further encourage those not in the alliance to be killed of (again making them quit even sooner) (again a reset after this stage could solve it with the only thing being fixed is politics and ministers for 72 ticks)

In stage 3 Forcing people to join alliances just won't work. Even if you can't attack them; you can still spy and harm them in a lot of ways. I certainly wouldnt want to work for people that destroyed my chance at a good ranking. Also after a while there will be say 4 major Empires. However 1 is sized 1k planets, 1 is sized 750, 1 300 and 1 400. Being in those of 300 and 400 just isnt a nice thing because you can be pretty sure your Empire will be assimilated sooner or later. People will welcome being killed by the biggest alliance early on.

To sum it up. I must admit its a nice try to bring n00bs in alliances, but I think its not the right way to do it. At stage 1 there won't even be an alliance and when things heat up in stage 2 you need an alliance BEFORE you get killed, not afterwards. Forcing planets to abide cluster alliances set by MOC and GC is a nice addition to the game though.

[Makhil]

1st stage is about skill, you don't need to attack your gal mate, you only have to be the biggest score at the end of the week. Attacks are enabled for those who can't find a better way to settle the matter, but the idea is to avoid that, coz by attacking someone you won't grow to be the biggest ingal especially if other gal mates defend the target.

The idea of the stages is that even if you lose the 1st one, you can win the 2nd one, and even if you lose the 2nd, you can win the 3rd.
This will bring more politics and diplomacy into the game. By joining an alliance early, by quitting it if things turn bad, there will be a lot of movement and no stagnation. Only fewer and fewer alliances until at the end there is only two... but even the smallest gal will have an impact and a purpose to play the game.

[Helix]

In some ways this could be good. As I am sure everyone has seen this round has clearly stagnated. What they need to do is split the round into 3 parts, where everyone is reset in between. This would make for more interesting possibilities, as the top players and galaxies from the first trimester of the round would probably face some big incoming after the first reset. This would help keep the game interesting all throughout the three months of play. However, the way you have yours set up is very counter productive. Because the galaxies that do "fight it out" will then surely lose the coming cluster war due to their lack of size. And the same goes for the clusters..

[mist]

not sure about the imposed tax in the second stage.
first stage is a little long i think

overall, sounds fun

-mist

[wakey]

I've always thought a slightly less formal implementation of this kind of idea would be good. I'm sure most of you have played the likes of C&C or Civ and if so your know these use a thing called 'Cloak of war" to hide much of the map at the start. To find out whats behind the cloak you have to explore and I've always thought finding a way to do this in PA would be great. You see in theory it would force the galaxy to become closer, would remove alot of the alliance factor early on thus throwing the rounds balance into the mix and will bring about some intresting galaxy interactions early on as you have to decide "Do i roid this galaxy we have just found or do we ally with them so we have backup". Plus also with galaxies having to be found first it means new galaxies that join late would gain more early protection as you wouldnt come out of 72hour protection and be visable by the whole universe thus the number of potential attackers is going to be much smaller.

The problem is deciding how it would work. In the past this idea has been suggested as both a Planet task or a galaxy one. TBH i perfer it being a task the galaxy would ahve to undertake and work together on.

So you start in your galaxy of x number of planets, and this is all you can see but its not much use for the game as theres no-one to attack. So we would need some kind of construction that the galaxy would ahve to undertake, possible through the use of a new minister role.

Now as far as i can see it there would be two ways of working this
a) via a galaxy construction such as a Telescope
b) via Explorers

Lets look at both in more detail
A) Telescope would already be built and working from tick 1 but at the lowest level making detection of new galaxy hard. The Minsiter could increase the efficiency but at a cost to the galaxy, how this cost would be collected I'm not sure as theres a number possible ways and i'm not sure what would be best. Each tick the telescope would do a scan using a detection forumula that took into account the efficiency level of the telescope and how close the next undetected galaxy was. So for example if you were 1:5 then 1:6 would be alot easier to find as would 1:4 but 1:7 and 1:3 would be a little harder. The further away the more difficult finding them would be.

b)Using a fund the minsiter could build explorers, obviously there would have to be some kidn of limit to the number of explorers each galaxy could have probally linked to size. Each tick each explorer would ahve a chance of locating another galaxy

Now I havent really gone into any real detail here as i'm basiclaly thinking on my feet while trying to recall what was suggested in the past and how those ideas evolved but i'm sure you get the basic idea and can probally give some input on the idea while I go away and have a think about it and jot a few more detaisl ect down

[Chax]

In utopia you can only see your own island (cluster/parallel) until 3h OOP at which point 1 island in each direction becomes visible to you. This is repeated with a new pair becoming visible every 3h. They implemented this to reduce farming.

[mist]

was thinking a similar thing to wakey thismorning

something like a "tech tree" for the GC to complete. they get extra resources while it's being done, at a set rate per tick, which pay for the researches, but it's a tactical choice whether you do the researches immediatly or wait a few ticks so you can use the initial resources to speed your planet, but your gal suffers for it (and you possibly loose GC).

anyway, the techs would be something like (coordsinates being in the form X:Y:Z for the explanations below):
- gal tech one -> tells you your gal their Z coordinate, IE planet number. this tech lets you launch ships in gal at the standard eta.
-gal tech two -> gives a further -1 eta in gal,, allows cluster tech research
-gal tech 3 -> gives a further -1 eta in gal

-cluster tech 1 -> tells you your Y coordinate. enables browsing of other gals in your cluster. enables ship launches to other gals in your cluster. enables the forming and/or joining of cluster alliances
-cluster tech 2 -> gives gal members a -1 eta in cluster

cluster alliance tech 1 -> gives -1 eta to members
cluster alliance tech 2 -> gives something "cool" that'll differentiate between alliances, such as a little extra attack, defence, covert opps protection, whatever

-universe tech 1 -> tells you your X coordinate. enables browsing of all gals. enables ship launches to all gals. enables the forming and/or joining of normal alliances

universe alliance tech 1 -> gives -1eta to alliance mates
universe alliance tech 2 -> more "pokey" version of cluster alliance tech 2

this would be good because:
it makes gals more important, but means you can survive with a crap gal
it gives newbies a gradual introduction to the game, by making it expand in stages
it gives people time to get to know each other etc before alliance politics come in to things too heavily. while alliances are obviouisly important to the game, they make it hard for new players to integrate and enjoy the game, so giving people a few weeks "grace" to get the hang of things seems a good idea.

in order to pay for the alliance techs, there would be an alliance fund, not sure of the specifics of it, but you get teh idea.

-mist

[hook]

To threadstarter:

Awesome idea,


I loved it!

[Helix]

how did this turn into a multi stage game to fog of war?

shouldn't you have put that on a new thread wakey?

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Helix

how did this turn into a multi stage game to fog of war?

shouldn't you have put that on a new thread wakey?

Well the initial idea in this thread is in effect a very crude implementation of a Fog of war imho which is what led me onto the fog of war idea which is really a less rigid version of what he was suggesting.

And yes maybe it should have its own thread but not only have I been a bit busy recently thus didnt have enough time to really come up with a idea structured enough to warrent starting a thread but I was also getting a headache from this god awful xmas theme and just wanted to close the forums to save my eyes

Anyway will probally post it in its own thread in coming days

[Yeggstry]

Originally Posted by wakey

...Fog of war idea...

One of the best suggestions I've seen for PA. PLEASE make sure that whoever is making next round knows about it, coz with it we may actually stand a chance of keeping some of the newbies in the game.

[Qdeathstar]

sounds good at the cluster and universe level...but i think the galaxy is not the place for attacking, epecially since there, you choose your leaders.

I guess what your talking about is whoever the player w/ the highest score and the three highes scores are leaders, i think thta is bad because from my expereince, some w/ high scores werent teamates..

[Helix]

personally fog of war destroys planetarion.

Planetarion has been built up with everyone having their own network of friends etc... fog of war would destroy that and you would instantly lose around 75% of your player base. It might help keep newbies, but there aren't enough newbies to outweigh the loss of your hardcore base.