YEAH!! That is great news!@ Eclipse
The numbers listed in your table are the number of parts required for each Civ in order to launch their ship. That number does not imply that only 2 SS Engines can be built in the entire game. On top of that, you can chose to build either 1 or 2 SS Engines. If you build 2, your space ship arrives sooner. You can also chose to build fewer or more SS Thrusters and SS Casings.
Please see this article to understand the spaceship build requirements, travel times and success %.
My vote is for #2... makes for a more realistic scenario as to why we would have 7 civs all landing on a planet relatively at the same time.
I set up a quick test city this weekend. A size 21 city with plenty of resources, buildings and improved tiles was going to take 46 turns to research Satellites (7800) and 35 turns to complete the Apollo Program.
So, either you guys should plan on part 1 of this game taking more than just a 100 turns or I'll need to start each civ with at least a 3-city empire to speed things up a bit.
My original thinking was to give each player one well-developed city, a worker or three, a settler, a few defensive units, a few scouting units, and a few pre-improved tiles scattered around the island so that the second city (and possibly more should the player decide to expand before building the ship) would get off the ground quickly. I think this would lead to a fun game with many different ways to play and it would provide more separation between the finishing dates.
If the goal is just to finish this first part quickly to get on to Part 2, then I'll need to re-think my original plan.
I think this first part of the game sounds fun so if I were playing, I'd vote for something along the lines of my original plan. But... I'm just the map maker. Let me know what you guys want and I'll do the best to set up a fun scenario.
Everything about this statement is great. The Settler, Workers and tile improvements will help speed the game on, It may not speed the SS but will free you up to build other things I think when there is more strategy involved there will be more enjoyment.My original thinking was to give each player one well-developed city, a worker or three, a settler, a few defensive units, a few scouting units, and a few pre-improved tiles scattered around the island so that the second city (and possibly more should the player decide to expand before building the ship) would get off the ground quickly. I think this would lead to a fun game with many different ways to play and it would provide more separation between the finishing dates.