I feel a great idea for maps for long term games (but will probably require research to be on slow or an extension to the tree) is this map from Sword of the stars, you'd have to play a galaxy for a certain amount of turns then it changes and you have to try again...

stasik28 wrote:
I feel a great idea for maps for long term games (but will probably require research to be on slow or an extension to the tree) is this map from Sword of the stars, you'd have to play a galaxy for a certain amount of turns then it changes and you have to try again...

You can't change the map mid game in ES tho o.O

Response to suggestions:



Medium Galaxy - your settings are good but I would also add Many Constellations as a requirement



Points - My issue is being allied with the winner and being 2nd gives you MORE points than the winner, so to me that is a fail. It should be +2 points. I like the original idea of being dead at the end being 1/2 the value of your position.





On the bidding would it be blind bidding? Also, I don't see why you would ever get screwed. If your affinity, say Sophons, is bidded by 7 players from 60 down to 54, you just bid 53 and if you don't, well you pick something else... Remember there would be a LOT of bidding rounds until no one wants to change (hence my suggestion it can be done quickly on skype - though you could probably do it almost as fast on chat). You just write a list of the affinities and points and who had the last bid. So my idea was a round robin that continues until no one bids for an entire round (all 8 players). At most being last costs 1 point.



A good mod may be an excellent idea. However there may be a lot of fighting over it. Perhaps each change requires a vote, gets tested, and then voted on again. Majority has to approve it to test, and then approve it again after playing it.

Vypuero wrote:
Response to suggestions:



Medium Galaxy - your settings are good but I would also add Many Constellations as a requirement

Works for me.

Points - My issue is being allied with the winner and being 2nd gives you MORE points than the winner, so to me that is a fail. It should be +2 points. I like the original idea of being dead at the end being 1/2 the value of your position.

Yes. The second place thing was intentional. It encourages the 1st place player to ally with someone else (or he still effectively loses the game since the 2nd player will get more points). This encourages 1st and 2nd place players to be in separate alliances for purposes of alliance balance (which is also why I want it limited to 1 ally.). So the alliances are usually going to be between the 1st place player and the 4th if they first player wants to 'win' the game [getthemostpointsontheladder]. This makes it much, much harder to build an invincible alliance (which in a 5-6p game, a 2p team of the 1st & 2nd often is). It also just generally kills the permanent alliances since 'winning' with an ally results in teh ally getting the most points if you eliminate the other players.



I suppose we could artificially induce it by requiring the players in the top half for score (e.g. 1st & 2nd) to ally with those in the lower half (3,4,5 in a 5p, 4,5,6 in a 6p, etc). The goal isn't to eliminate alliances, just prevent overwhelming ones.



I'm against the death being half points because it encourages one player to eliminate other players based on their score on the ladder rather than other factors. (e.g. If the guy ahead of me on the ladder is in the game...eliminating him will likely guarantee I move up). I guess I prefer a lack of metagaming-caused-by-scores bit unless its for balance reasons. Half-on-death also double penalizes dying since you get stuck in the last place possible at the time of your death AND you only get half the points. But if you really want to adjust things maybe....



Winner (triggers victory condition) - 10 points

Death - 50% of the points, round up. (You round inconsistently in the OP so its best just to stick with rounding up since it is the normal order at .5)

Players in 1st place cannot ally with anyone above 4th place at the time of the alliance.

place - survived,died

2nd - 7,4

3rd - 6,3

4th - 5,3

5th - 4,2

6th - 3,2

7th - 2,1

8th - 1,1

On the bidding would it be blind bidding? Also, I don't see why you would ever get screwed. If your affinity, say Sophons, is bidded by 7 players from 60 down to 54, you just bid 53 and if you don't, well you pick something else... Remember there would be a LOT of bidding rounds until no one wants to change (hence my suggestion it can be done quickly on skype - though you could probably do it almost as fast on chat). You just write a list of the affinities and points and who had the last bid. So my idea was a round robin that continues until no one bids for an entire round (all 8 players). At most being last costs 1 point.

0) Nope. Goal is to complete bidding in at most 3 rounds.

1) Alot of bidding rounds is not quick. Ever. With 8 players.

2) Lets say, for the sake of argument, the following happens:

I want Sophons, I lose Sophons ('cause it goes down to something dumb like 30pts).

Everyone else bids sanely and UE ends up being bid at like 55.

I want Cravers, but its next to last to be bid on. So I wait. Its only me and one other guy. And he is willing to go down to like 30 pts too.

So I get stuck with Affinities I hate like Amoeba or Sowers and a 5pt advantage over the UE player (whose Affinity is mechanically stronger than a 5pt gap). I'd be screwed.



Honestly, I'd rather just let players create their races rather than do the bidding. I understand you are trying to balance the bad Affinities. But a game where everyone plays Craver, Sophon, UE, or Hissho is fine...honestly. Someone, with guaranteed admin, might even play a Pilgrim. But Sowers, Amoeba, Horatio, and Automatons [withoutbeingabletomicrothemingameswithtimedturns] are all objectively weaker affinities (except in unusual situations like Old galaxies, Sowers might switch categories or in 3+ man alliances games where an Amoeba can scout for their allies from the start).

A good mod may be an excellent idea. However there may be a lot of fighting over it. Perhaps each change requires a vote, gets tested, and then voted on again. Majority has to approve it to test, and then approve it again after playing it.

It should just be limited to fixing the random element that causes a rapid shift in effective power in a game (Heroes). The goal is to avoid randomness from screwing people over, not to seriously change game balance. I don't think we should do more than that because of the fighting issue.

New Longer Term Game Proposal

Rationale: A series of games in a Medium Galaxy with dedicated players willing to play to the end game. Placing will also matter, so points can be scored for an ongoing leader board:

Winner: 10 Points

Other Places (Survival/Death)

2[SUP]nd[/SUP] Place: 7/4 Points

3[SUP]rd[/SUP] Place: 6/3 Points

4[SUP]th[/SUP] Place: 5/3 Points

5[SUP]th[/SUP] Place: 4/2 Points

6[SUP]th[/SUP] Place: 3/2 Points

7[SUP]th[/SUP] Place: 2/1 Points

8[SUP]th[/SUP] Place: 1/1 Points





From a gaming perspective, a time will be established to regularly meet and/or set up at the end of each session. If someone does not show up they forfeit their position and another player who was eliminated or who has joined may take your place and gain points. If no one is available then you will be AI and can take your position back next session if you wish to.



House Rules for Diplomacy in Endless Space

Rationale: The purpose of these rules is to bring some semblance of what true diplomacy is often like between nations, and to reflect the fact that even despots are not truly in complete control of an entire race or nation of people. Instead, politics makes things more complicated:

Peace Treaty – No changes here except when combined with other treaties below.

Announcement: It should be announced in the game when a treaty is made.

Termination: A termination is also announced. At the same time, the Peace Treaty should be cancelled and re-offered in order to allow for a 10 Turn period of Peace, so war can’t happen until the time has passed. It is permissible for the offer to be refused, meaning both parties are likely interested in war.

Alliances: Alliances can only have 2 players, ever. Alliances cannot be between the 1st player and anyone ranked higher than 4th at the time of the Alliance.

AI Diplomacy: Since the AI has such strange tendencies in the game that can be abused, all players are forbidden from any offers to/from the AI that last longer than the current turn with the exception of Cease Fire/Peace/Cooperation Agreements. The intention is not to play this with AI but sometimes that may happen.

Declarations of War: These must be announced from a state of Peace or Cold War and announced to all of the Players. If an Alliance is involved and you leave it, then the requirements above still apply.

Game Times: Announced in advance publicly, must have enough players agree to it to make a game (5). Each ladder player cannot be in more than 3 ongoing ladder games at a given time.



House Settings

All games will be Medium & 8 players [48stars,6perplayer] OR Small & 5-6 players [5-6systems/player]

Galaxy will always be Young.

AI difficult will always be Impossible.

Speed will always be Normal.

System Balancing Perfect & Many Planets Per System & Many Constellations

All victory conditions except Wonder Victory.

Pirates and Random Events Off (Exploration Events can be on or off, goal is to avoid the 'HAHA YOU LOSE' events that break your economy for 20 turns only affecting one player)

Other options are optional.

A hero balance Mod that either removes Pilot/Admin classes or makes all heroes Pilot/Admin must be in use. For clarity, nothing else will be changed with the mod.

Im sorta new to multiplayer but I'm wondering if the galaxy age/planets per system/constelation amount are strongly biased towards certain affinities/defaultrace. As I played on my own I always thought the game was balanced around the default settings.



Edit: I suppose the bidding takes care of it.

Ok some more responses:



1 - I like the idea of not having such unbeatable alliances. So I am not sure I don't like your idea as it stands. One thing is what happens when as a result of an alliance positions change? Interesting - you may decide to break it? What about doing so at last minute to change game? We have to consider that too. Both ideas could work, have to think it through. It also might mean less support in an alliance so you don't let the junior partner get too strong, i.e. balance it - give them stuff to help, but not so much that they catch up to you.



2 - I didn't consider meta gaming points. That may be an issue.



3 - I am still thinking you misunderstand bidding. It is not we all bid on each race but we all bid on ANY race. So I can choose sophons but you can pick cravers next and so on. The poorer affinites will all end up with more points than the good ones, balancing it out. Does that make sense? So if right at the top I pick automatons 60 I don't have to bother bidding again unless someone else bids under it.

Honestly, if we limit games to 5p...we could just ban alliances comfortably and call it a day which might be simplest. Getting a reliable pool of more than 5 players around is difficult.



With the bidding, we can try it if you really want but I don't see the practical value in it since the bad affinities we already know are bad. I wouldn't take Sowers at max points. I'd just concede :P