SABA wrote:
mash all the people to goo and make grease, to lube their parts

Hey check out my new lubricant, it's "organic"... I'm definitely going to play that race

yup... scale has always been my annoyance with planet takeovers. How do 6.. or 600 or even 6000 marines, interceptors or pick your Mech unit type quell an entire native population?

With big and nasty guns, well at least nastier than the planet you are invading's guns. 6000 is plenty if the opponent only has 4000.



And yes, you will always have to use a bit of imagination regarding scale. You wouldn't want to go through umpteen different battles for every city a planet might have. You just want to defeat them militarily. 1 battle with all the planets military forces and then its over one way or the other.

Well a 4x Game is about the big picture, not about the micro-management, I think.



Keep in mind that he, who controls the space around the planet can blast you to oblivion if need be... means that the need for troops is rather on the low side.

Perhaps as a must for occupation, one could have an obligation to have a small fleet orbiting the planet for a certain number of turns, till assimilation is complete.

SABA wrote:
With big and nasty guns, well at least nastier than the planet you are invading's guns. 6000 is plenty if the opponent only has 4000.



And yes, you will always have to use a bit of imagination regarding scale. You wouldn't want to go through umpteen different battles for every city a planet might have. You just want to defeat them militarily. 1 battle with all the planets military forces and then its over one way or the other.

Yes, if the owner of the planet is able to get superiority in the space overhead, it could just bomb the invasion forces to scrap.

Sharidann wrote:
Well a 4x Game is about the big picture, not about the micro-management, I think.



Keep in mind that he, who controls the space around the planet can blast you to oblivion if need be... means that the need for troops is rather on the low side.

Perhaps as a must for occupation, one could have an obligation to have a small fleet orbiting the planet for a certain number of turns, till assimilation is complete.

What woudl be interesting are options : when you invade, the game calculates how much time is needed, then you can shorten that length with deadly weapons. But at the cost of livability and population you get.

For instance you have 1000 pop to subdue, and 1000 Military Power It would take 10 turns. If you want to do it in 9 turns you'll kill 10% of the pop and the planet will have it's growth halved for 10 turns. If you want to get it in 8 turns, you'll kill 20% of the population and you'll get half growth for 20 turns, etc.

VieuxChat wrote:
What woudl be interesting are options : when you invade, the game calculates how much time is needed, then you can shorten that length with deadly weapons. But at the cost of livability and population you get.

For instance you have 1000 pop to subdue, and 1000 Military Power It would take 10 turns. If you want to do it in 9 turns you'll kill 10% of the pop and the planet will have it's growth halved for 10 turns. If you want to get it in 8 turns, you'll kill 20% of the population and you'll get half growth for 20 turns, etc.

Of course the already installed planetary infrastructure gets damaged worse than by "just" invading. There should be a chance for every interesting building to become scrapped, depending on your brutality..

Exactly. One little ship might kill the home fleet with tech but a fear of rebellion should require a fleet to control.



Plus I hated the sotse (tho I understand) bomb the home planet and all the surrounding installations shut down.

I do wonder whether the Cravers would even be interested in preserving any population of planets they invade. Their primary interest is in the resources - dust / Endless remains which they consume, so they probably wouldn't even care if things are in one piece or smashed during warfare. IDK. maybe they can use the population as slave labor or for scientific experiments or something (mash all the people to goo and make grease, to lube their parts). (Apologies to the squeamish)

The cravers could choose to kill everyone and get as much Dust as the population killed (with the proper tech for sure).

yup... scale has always been my annoyance with planet takeovers. How do 6.. or 600 or even 6000 marines, interceptors or pick your Mech unit type quell an entire native population?



that many couldnt even take over New York! (or Paris for u Frenchie types)



Perhaps it's better to leave it abstract if a sense of realistic depth is desired. but... yeah I still want it

Environmentally friendly too!

SABA wrote:
Environmentally friendly too!

absolutely, well it could be sort of biohazardous if handled inappropriately, due to its origin, but if you do that to dozens of planets you start perfecting the tech

Off topic I know but all this got me thinking about the Cravers... yeah for these guys who cares about ground combat? they do not need you or your planet alive.



Wow. nothing left behind so no danger of an uprising. no research without destruction so no stopping the expansion. no diplomacy worries so no issues with betrayal or loyalty. who are these guys!?



Cravers sound like a spreading stain of darkness through the Galaxy consuming everything in their path. In fact, once they perfect their Sun harvester even suns will wink out in their wake...



clearly i'm taking their race credo to an extreme but. how on earth do you keep a race wtih none of the physical/ethical constraints of a true civilization in check? Do they have a 'Genghis Khan' hero which keeps them focused outward who could potentially die? Is their lack of infrastructure limiting to their supply chain forcing them to expand from their homeworld in 'waves'?



Are these guys so pissed off at the Endless that they hate/devour everyone or, devoid of emotion, do they focus their destruction on certain race types?



Since they can only derive research/military points from conquest would it be reasonable to assume they would not learn a higher tech level than their 'victim'?



I just knoooooow the Craver backstory is gonna get more interesting as we start to explore their Raison d'être.



Now, if only they had cool HATS

maceman wrote:
Off topic I know but all this got me thinking about the Cravers... yeah for these guys who cares about ground combat? they do not need you or your planet alive.

No, but perhaps killing something with bombs is not as efficient for dust-gathering or they just miss the bloodcurding screams of their victims as they rip them apart...

maceman wrote:
clearly i'm taking their race credo to an extreme but. how on earth do you keep a race wtih none of the physical/ethical constraints of a true civilization in check? Do they have a 'Genghis Khan' hero which keeps them focused outward who could potentially die? Is their lack of infrastructure limiting to their supply chain forcing them to expand from their homeworld in 'waves'?

I think the common denominator is: "WE Waaaaaaaaaant DUSSSSSSSSSSSSSST!", you know? Think of the worst addictives in the universe. If heroes had some kind of control, they'd probably be the drug dealers equivalent of the cravers race. I can imagine it like: "See, people? You give me taxes, I show you the next nice dustcache. If you don't honor me, I'm going to let you go crazy with craving. Understood? Good almost brainless robot race. *pat pat*"

maceman wrote:
Are these guys so pissed off at the Endless that they hate/devour everyone or, devoid of emotion, do they focus their destruction on certain race types?

Robot race and emotion don't necessarily mix. We're not talking about no. 5 here, I imagine.

maceman wrote:
Since they can only derive research/military points from conquest would it be reasonable to assume they would not learn a higher tech level than their 'victim'?

I understood it, so far at least, in the way, that you get research points by conquest. It is not as if they'd just assimilate foreign technology. So you can still research the way you want to, but only if you kill sufficient numbers of victims for it.

maceman wrote:
I just knoooooow the Craver backstory is gonna get more interesting as we start to explore their Raison d'être.

Seconded.

maceman wrote:
Now, if only they had cool HATS

Robot heads > metallic hats!

I wonder if we can expect some kind of evolution in the Cravers in terms of changing behavioral pattern and developing more complex relationships with the other races. This could be something that becomes available through the tech tree or is activated by some notable galactic events... After all one of the key features mentioned in the Craver's description is their rapid evolution. Would we have a word in how this evolution goes though...

maceman wrote:
Are these guys so pissed off at the Endless that they hate/devour everyone or, devoid of emotion, do they focus their destruction on certain race types?

Lore says that they don't care about the Endless because they don't really know who they were (they were bombed to ston age or close to it by the endless, so no memories of what have been before). For now.

VieuxChat wrote:
Lore says that they don't care about the Endless because they don't really know who they were (they were bombed to ston age or close to it by the endless, so no memories of what have been before). For now.

Still



Nothing does nothing for no reason (see what I did there? triple negative! I think that reaffirms the nearly cancelled out double negative. or something)



I'm just waiting for Skamaks to drop a bomb and bring out the really outlandish races :P



til then I keep dreaming of Cravers in their massive ships shaped like yurts drinking salt tea. (mongolia is reeeeaaallly close by)

(mongolia is reeeeaaallly close by)

Are you sure they have enough hatz for you ?

I think time consuming ground combat would drag the game and make it too slow.I would only like see an abstracted system but with some depth to that abstraction like the MOO3.

Not a heck of a lot is mentioned on ground battles other than that there will be ground battles and they will involve heroes of a certain type for melee. As time goes by I am sure we will find out more.



I like your ideas, and agree, some good involvement with ground battles could add a nice extra flavor to the game.

It reminds me that too few games let us recreate tthe kind of battles that occur in the Dune series, and the warfare involved (using special species from the world : worms, or how missiles are usefull, or how concealment works (fremen), or how hard weather condition change how you fight : the importance of water and distils)

I also find the ideas interesting... But for me it would be almost a different game.

Of course, in an ideal world, with an endless (pun intended) budget, you can probably make a 4x with a space combat simulator, a ground combat simulator and an RPG included somewhere to boot.

But then it isn't a 4X anymore.

We will have - through the heroes - a bit of an RPG element, the battles in the trailer look good, we have to figure out how they work out tactically... Ground combat, well I agree about it for an expansion... For a main game, not so sure, as for me it isn't exactly the core of a 4x game.

I agree about it for an expansion... For a main game, not so sure, as for me it isn't exactly the core of a 4x game.

Yes I agree, though we don't know exactly how involved ground battle is, the focus does seem to be more on outer space elements.

SABA wrote:
Yes I agree, though we don't know exactly how involved ground battle is, the focus does seem to be more on outer space elements.

And that doesn't have to be a bad thing. Everyone wants at least one really good, deep and complex combat system. Two is a bit much for the first release, probably...



Anyways, there will probably be tons of technologies and race-dependent modifiers already. If I remember correctly, it was stated that ground battles could last several turns, so there is a more complex element involved than in other 4x-games, already. Anyone remembers the reference?

Gratuitous Tank Battles style?

maceman wrote:
Gratuitous Tank Battles style?

Yes, please. That would just be Awesome. (yes, with a capital "A")

Sharidann wrote:
I also find the ideas interesting... But for me it would be almost a different game.

Of course, in an ideal world, with an endless (pun intended) budget, you can probably make a 4x with a space combat simulator, a ground combat simulator and an RPG included somewhere to boot.

But then it isn't a 4X anymore.

We will have - through the heroes - a bit of an RPG element, the battles in the trailer look good, we have to figure out how they work out tactically... Ground combat, well I agree about it for an expansion... For a main game, not so sure, as for me it isn't exactly the core of a 4x game.

Completely agree with Sharidann on this matter.

Being new to these forums I would first like to say that you guys have an amazing and unique design philosophy to creating games. I hope this turns out to be a successful venture so we see more of this approach when designing games.



With that said, one of my main issues with these types of games is they almost never put any creativity or resources behind ground combat. It almost always seems like an afterthought to the base game design, which I’ve never understood. Tactical space battles are obviously very exciting when done properly and the draw of most players here, but I think a lot can be said for taking part in the struggles of your ground forces as they fight campaigns across exotic and strange worlds.



I realize it’s probably a little late in development to implement actual tactical battles at this stage, but I am wondering if this is something that the game engine would be capable of supporting for a possible expansion down the road and if there is any interest in exploring this area more?



To be clear, I’m not talking total war style graphics or hour long battles (although that would be nifty) but just a simple game map representative of the type of world your fighting on with a handful of units controlled in a traditional RTS fashion. If you look at games like company of heroes without the base building (maybe defensive building) you have an intuitive system which takes complex ideas like cover and fire support and makes them fast and fun, making an ideal base to work with.



Beyond the tactical battles, you don’t see much attention given to the advancement of weapons and tactics ground units would use. I would like to see some tech trees that deal with this whether its advancement of infantry weapons, mechs and tanks, air support, or tactics there would be a lot of possibilities to explore. Even if a species became space faring it’s a little silly to think they wouldn’t still develop strong ground forces and advance technology for those considering your resources and population are all still on planets and unless you bombard a planet to dust troops are needed for invasions.



In lieu (or support of) tactical battles I think there are other possibilities to explore here with the ground game. I’d like to see a system of “special” mission types. For instance with the proper research you could develop elite units capable of assassinating or capturing enemy heroes, destroying or disabling structures or defenses, or possibly after an enemy ground invasion fighting a guerilla war on the planet disrupting the enemy’s ability to build new structures and having negative effects on the economy of the planet.



The last thing I would like to see is a more RPG feel to the troops, being able to name them like ships and they develop experience as they go making them more effective and lethal. They could be upgradable from simple militia for defense of colonies to your more specialized elite strike forces with unique abilities for special operation style combat and supplemental to recon fleets.





Just some ideas I’ve been kicking around in my head I think would add some depth to the game and set it apart from others on the market.

What i like about Gratuitous Tank Battles is... it's basically the same principles as space battles. Design your basic units, give them some strategy and send em off to war! (I need a tissue).



Yes it would involve a lot more technology and detail than most are looking for and yes it screams expansion... but wouldn't the AI required for it be largely the same as the space combat?

and speaking of which how fun would it be to call in an airstrike from orbit?

Yeah, I didn't really think it would be something that would work in the initial release just more curious if its possible with the current engine in the game and if any thought has been given to it. The time issue I don't think would matter much for single player as there should be an option to auto-resolve included so you would basically only be fighting the important battles or none at all if that's what you wished. The issues comes in multiplayer as people tend to be more competitive and wouldn't be fond of an auto-resolve given the random nature of it which could dramatically slow the pace of the game.. I think the only simple solution to that would be allowing it to be toggled in the game set up so people who don't like it wouldn't have an issue and could play with like minded players.



As far as it not being 4x enough, this is a relatively stagnant genre for a reason and that's because it doesn't appeal to people who don't like looking at charts and graphs for the majority of gameplay. I'm not saying that those charts and graphs aren't important or that the game should be dumbed down in any form, but appealing to different types of gamers and making the game more attractive is better for everyone involved meaning more money to the devs and more features expansions for us.



Gratuitous tank battles is a perfect example of how something can be simple and fast but also engaging and a lot of fun. And I'm willing to bet that game didn't have an epic budget to work with.

I thought the MOO2 concept of ground combat was the best. Results depended entirely on technology and race modifications (and heroes too, I think). It’s simple and fast but it provides you some idea of how good (or bad) your ground troops fare in a fight as well as fun eye candy, watching troops, tanks and walkers slug it out. I don’t think too much work should go into ground combat – it’s the space combat that really matters.

Stretchycheese wrote:
I thought the MOO2 concept of space combat was the best. Results depended entirely on technology and race modifications (and heroes too, I think). It’s simple and fast but it provides you some idea of how good (or bad) your ground troops fare in a fight as well as fun eye candy, watching troops, tanks and walkers slug it out. I don’t think too much work should go into ground combat – it’s the space combat that really matters.

I agree, I wouldn't want any time or focus taken away from space combat. Without epic space combat the ground stuff wouldn't matter anyways because the game wouldn't be as fun during the type of combat that you would be active in 90% of the time, I'd rather just see it as an addition once things are feature complete.

I've always like the options of being able to bombard a planet from orbit or invading the planet. However, I've noticed that most games have the planetary invasion occur instantaneously. You land the troops, they overwhelm the defensive army in a day or two, and the planet is yours by the next turn. I'm in favor of a hands off approach, or even a "choose your strategy for invasion" like in Galactic Civilizations, but it's always bothered me that invasions happen instantaneously. Planets are large places, and planets that are well developed shouldn't be an easy pushover. It should take time for an invasion to be successful. In Distant Worlds, it can take a long time for an invasion to end, and I found that I liked it. It's more realistic. It takes time to fight a war. That's my two cents.

In 10 min space strategy, you have to bomb the planets to 0 pop to be able to colonize them. So big planets can resist longer.