Actual expansion?
- Thread starter JoeyB98
- Start date
TC01
Deity
I'm afraid "development" might be a strong word, but yes, I have thought a great deal about this in the past and would love to see some of it get into Final Frontier.
From order of easiest to hardest (there are other things that aren't new leaders or civs we could add too of course):
1. I would love to add a second leader for each existing civilization. The original release of Finaler Frontier had a second leader but I think at the time I elected to disable them until new leaderhead art / flavor text / names got selected. And then this never happened
2. I was hesitant to add more human civilizations, but if you have ideas, then I'd be happy to hear them! Probably not more than 4 though, because...
3. Some ground-work for adding alien civilizations was laid in 1.7 and 1.8 and there's some more code sitting on one of my machines somewhere. The idea was that there would be some races that had already discovered space-flight and were already out there, and others that would be spawned through very rare goody events (the "first contact" event but instead of the civ joining you, they start their own civilization). Think the Mercurians and the Infernals from FFH2, if you're familiar with that, but firing much earlier in the game.
The problem is that I never sat down and wrote out any backstory for aliens and neither did anyone else.
("Race" and "civ" would have ideally been kept distinct, since we already have eight human civs. We could add a race that had been in a civil war with itself for years, for instance. Then we have eight human civs + two civs of $other_race, for instance. Just an example of the kind of thing I was thinking about.)
Adding more civs would mean writing some original fiction, probably, which might also mean writing an official scenario or something.
Are you interested in working on any of this, by any chance? It's unlikely to happen if no one is interested in contributing, even if it's just ideas (normally we have too many ideas and not enough people doing work, but in this case I don't have any for alien races, really). I would say that (new leaders and human civs could happen with very little under-the-hood changes; IIRC the "holographic leader effect" thing is an effect that gets applied to otherwise normal leaderheads so you would just find some leaderheads you like (Either in the vanilla game or from any people have made).
Adding alien civs probably still requires some ground-work to make them happen "correctly". For example, Galactic Civilizations has a "Universal Translator" tech that has to be researched before you can do diplomacy with alien civs. I would happily do more work on the back-end to make this sort of thing possible.
From order of easiest to hardest (there are other things that aren't new leaders or civs we could add too of course):
1. I would love to add a second leader for each existing civilization. The original release of Finaler Frontier had a second leader but I think at the time I elected to disable them until new leaderhead art / flavor text / names got selected. And then this never happened
2. I was hesitant to add more human civilizations, but if you have ideas, then I'd be happy to hear them! Probably not more than 4 though, because...
3. Some ground-work for adding alien civilizations was laid in 1.7 and 1.8 and there's some more code sitting on one of my machines somewhere. The idea was that there would be some races that had already discovered space-flight and were already out there, and others that would be spawned through very rare goody events (the "first contact" event but instead of the civ joining you, they start their own civilization). Think the Mercurians and the Infernals from FFH2, if you're familiar with that, but firing much earlier in the game.
The problem is that I never sat down and wrote out any backstory for aliens and neither did anyone else.
("Race" and "civ" would have ideally been kept distinct, since we already have eight human civs. We could add a race that had been in a civil war with itself for years, for instance. Then we have eight human civs + two civs of $other_race, for instance. Just an example of the kind of thing I was thinking about.)
Adding more civs would mean writing some original fiction, probably, which might also mean writing an official scenario or something.
Are you interested in working on any of this, by any chance? It's unlikely to happen if no one is interested in contributing, even if it's just ideas (normally we have too many ideas and not enough people doing work, but in this case I don't have any for alien races, really). I would say that (new leaders and human civs could happen with very little under-the-hood changes; IIRC the "holographic leader effect" thing is an effect that gets applied to otherwise normal leaderheads so you would just find some leaderheads you like (Either in the vanilla game or from any people have made).
Adding alien civs probably still requires some ground-work to make them happen "correctly". For example, Galactic Civilizations has a "Universal Translator" tech that has to be researched before you can do diplomacy with alien civs. I would happily do more work on the back-end to make this sort of thing possible.
TC01
Deity
I've played a little of that, and found it pretty impressive! Meant to play more, have never gotten around to it.
Well, I also always like to see more Final Frontier (Plus) based mods for Civ 4.
I've thought a bit about possible new civilizations. I would like to try to implement a new alien race (possibly represented by several different civs). The idea I have is this:
Human civs all play practically the same (which isn't necessarily a bad thing) so I would like for this alien race to be truly alien. The thing I had in mind is production. Human civs get production from planets they inhabit and that results with some hammers per planet per turn. This new race would get hammers from planets but in a different way, by consuming (i.e. destroying) them. They could build a building on a planet that would convert that planet to some number of hammers that would be added to production so they could use those to build units using the overflow mechanic.
Of course, if they can convert planets to hammers, why wouldn't they be able to do so with asteroids? There could be a religious/ideological reason or there could be another civ from that race that does exactly that. About food and commerce, they could delay destruction of planets to grow population and then transport them off-system when last planet is destroyed or something like that. I was also thinking about some kind of worldship they would use like a moving star system.
All of this would lead to some kind of mid-late game sense of urgency due to ever-decreasing number of planets available.
However, this would require writing a lot of new AI code for both the new race and the humans. Also, it may easily be impossible to balance anything of this kind properly. Nevertheless, I'm willing to try to implement the basics to test whether this would work and be any fun.
Any comments are welcome.
Human civs all play practically the same (which isn't necessarily a bad thing) so I would like for this alien race to be truly alien. The thing I had in mind is production. Human civs get production from planets they inhabit and that results with some hammers per planet per turn. This new race would get hammers from planets but in a different way, by consuming (i.e. destroying) them. They could build a building on a planet that would convert that planet to some number of hammers that would be added to production so they could use those to build units using the overflow mechanic.
Of course, if they can convert planets to hammers, why wouldn't they be able to do so with asteroids? There could be a religious/ideological reason or there could be another civ from that race that does exactly that. About food and commerce, they could delay destruction of planets to grow population and then transport them off-system when last planet is destroyed or something like that. I was also thinking about some kind of worldship they would use like a moving star system.
All of this would lead to some kind of mid-late game sense of urgency due to ever-decreasing number of planets available.
However, this would require writing a lot of new AI code for both the new race and the humans. Also, it may easily be impossible to balance anything of this kind properly. Nevertheless, I'm willing to try to implement the basics to test whether this would work and be any fun.
Any comments are welcome.
TC01
Deity
Hm, so a space nomad kind of civilization? That would be cool, I think! (I am reminded vaguely of the mechanics of the Genghis Khan scenario for Warlords, although that obviously would not scale into a real civ, I think).
Converting asteroids -> hammers would basically be the equivalent of chopping down forests in vanilla. That's absolutely something that could be implemented as a mechanic.
Consuming planets might be more interesting. Here are a few thoughts: what if this race's colonizing of a system created a new planet, that only produced food + commerce? (This would be the worldship). Then, they get reduced gold from actual planets and have the option to consume that planet for a major hammers boost as well as a smaller gold + food boost.
I think implementing mobile cities would be kind of hard, but I wonder now that I say that if any other mods out there have done it, especially with the kinds of cities we have that don't really depend on the surrounding terrain.
EDIT: the obvious problem is, what do you do if the system you're colonizing has eight planets? Does one immediately get consumed on colonization?
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
"Chopping" Asteroids for a one time hammer boost is something that should have been implemented long ago, for all factions. It should provide a really big boost, like 100 hammers on normal speed at least, plus a +50% bonus from some currently neglected tech. Ideally the amount of hammers gained shouldn't decrease by distance as it does with forests, or at least it should only decline slightly, like e.g. by one % per tile away from nearest system. It should be enabled early mid game and take at least 10 worker turns.
That seems way too much.
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
Not if it takes long enough to conduct the mining operation. Chopping a forest in plain BtS provides about 30 hammers and takes 3 turns, so I don't see why an action that takes 10 turns shouldn't provide 100 hammers, especially with the distances we are talking here.
Yeah, but the total amount of available out-of-city hammers would be much higher, what could lead to major changes to players' tactics. I don't know, I'm not good enough player to properly evaluate possible consequences.
TC01
Deity
Neither am I!
I (or anyone, really) could release a small modmod with this feature implemented for the human civs and play some test games with it, and decide based on how they go.
I agree that a large amount of hammers would probably change things up too much-- as it stands, FF+ buildings aren't that expensive to build in a solar system with some production improvement buildings. There aren't many projects that require a lot of hammers to build-- see also the problem that there aren't enough (Great) Wonders...
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
Something that just occurred to me: Currently the only ways to deal with surplus population is to settle them on planets without food, build a Moonbase, or whip/draft them away. How about a new Space Station building that has the same effect as the Moonbase, but can be built on planets without moons?
Also I think we could introduce a building that can only be built on planets with rings, so they are good for more than aesthetics and that one wonder. I'm not really sure what it should do though, either some sort of orbital mining station that provides extra production or a smaller version of the Great Rings Park, a regular rings park if you will, that boosts trade and culture.
Finally let's get back to my proposed Dyson Sphere thingy. It should be the most hammer intensive thing you can build, and pretty late in the tech tree, so let's think of possible effects. The first thing that comes to mind is a bonus to production. Commerce, Research and Culture all also make sense. A system which utilizes its star's energy with 100% efficiency should be able to build pretty much anything in this mod in one turn. Obviously only one is buildable per system, if we don't just make it a Great Wonder.
I suggest something like this:
10.000 Hammer Cost (Now there's something you can chop all those asteroids into!)
+20 Hammers
+10 Commerce
+20 Research
+20 Influence
+100% Production
+50% Commerce
+50% Research
+50% Influence
Whether you use it to churn out an unstoppable armada, build Astral Gates or to get that final push for a culture victory, the Dyson Sphere is the mark of a future winner.
Also I think we could introduce a building that can only be built on planets with rings, so they are good for more than aesthetics and that one wonder. I'm not really sure what it should do though, either some sort of orbital mining station that provides extra production or a smaller version of the Great Rings Park, a regular rings park if you will, that boosts trade and culture.
Finally let's get back to my proposed Dyson Sphere thingy. It should be the most hammer intensive thing you can build, and pretty late in the tech tree, so let's think of possible effects. The first thing that comes to mind is a bonus to production. Commerce, Research and Culture all also make sense. A system which utilizes its star's energy with 100% efficiency should be able to build pretty much anything in this mod in one turn. Obviously only one is buildable per system, if we don't just make it a Great Wonder.
I suggest something like this:
10.000 Hammer Cost (Now there's something you can chop all those asteroids into!)
+20 Hammers
+10 Commerce
+20 Research
+20 Influence
+100% Production
+50% Commerce
+50% Research
+50% Influence
Whether you use it to churn out an unstoppable armada, build Astral Gates or to get that final push for a culture victory, the Dyson Sphere is the mark of a future winner.
God-Emperor
Deity
Once upon a time I was considering implementing "chopable" asteroids.
The idea I had was that you'd be able to spend a few turns mining them for hammers which would also convert the asteroid field into a partially depleted asteroid field. You'd then be able to do it gain, taking probably 50% longer for something like half or 2/3 as many hammers, leaving behind a depleted asteroid field feature which can not be mined anymore. I was not planning on changing the distance drop off for the yield. This would allow you to mine each of the nearby asteroids once for a good size bonus and still be able to do it again later for a smaller bonus. To some extent this produces an effect similar to the way forests can regrow in regular civ (since new asteroid fields don't show up during the game), allowing you to get some chopping later in the game, only more so.
Some of the problems that kept me from doing it are that the game is not really suffering from a production shortage - you'd just run out of things to build quicker. Adding more production would require going in and increasing the hammer cost of at least all of the buildings in the 2nd and later eras. Balancing it could be difficult. I'm guessing that the AI may be able to handle it since it does chopping in regular civ, although having 2 different chopables (if doing it the way I mentioned above) that have different yields and take different times may be something it can't manage very well.
The idea I had was that you'd be able to spend a few turns mining them for hammers which would also convert the asteroid field into a partially depleted asteroid field. You'd then be able to do it gain, taking probably 50% longer for something like half or 2/3 as many hammers, leaving behind a depleted asteroid field feature which can not be mined anymore. I was not planning on changing the distance drop off for the yield. This would allow you to mine each of the nearby asteroids once for a good size bonus and still be able to do it again later for a smaller bonus. To some extent this produces an effect similar to the way forests can regrow in regular civ (since new asteroid fields don't show up during the game), allowing you to get some chopping later in the game, only more so.
Some of the problems that kept me from doing it are that the game is not really suffering from a production shortage - you'd just run out of things to build quicker. Adding more production would require going in and increasing the hammer cost of at least all of the buildings in the 2nd and later eras. Balancing it could be difficult. I'm guessing that the AI may be able to handle it since it does chopping in regular civ, although having 2 different chopables (if doing it the way I mentioned above) that have different yields and take different times may be something it can't manage very well.
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
I'd also like to suggest buffing New Earth's Battlecarrier a bit, be it by lowering the cost or removing the strength reduction.
I have taken a look at the tech tree, and I suggest we put the ability to "chop" asteroids at Vacuum Engineering or Streamlined Production, my proposed Space Station and Rings buildings at Space Elevator, the Dyson Sphere at poor neglected Quantum Control, and a +50% boost to the hammer yield you get from asteroids at Industrialism. Also I looked at hammer costs of the Astral Gate pieces and came to the conclusion that 10.000 Hammers is a tad too high for the Dyson Sphere, 2.500 should be good enough.
I have taken a look at the tech tree, and I suggest we put the ability to "chop" asteroids at Vacuum Engineering or Streamlined Production, my proposed Space Station and Rings buildings at Space Elevator, the Dyson Sphere at poor neglected Quantum Control, and a +50% boost to the hammer yield you get from asteroids at Industrialism. Also I looked at hammer costs of the Astral Gate pieces and came to the conclusion that 10.000 Hammers is a tad too high for the Dyson Sphere, 2.500 should be good enough.
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
Why is there no future tech btw? Is there no infinitely re-researchable tech at the end of the tree for those who continue playing after victory?
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
Hmmmm... What actually is the reasoning behind Environmentalism and Utopia reducing Commerce rather than just giving them higher upkeep? Also Police State could still use a buff, perhaps +1 Happiness for Squadron Defense Network and Star Fortress so utilizing its drafting ability isn't ruining you as badly? I thought about extra happiness for Intelligence Agency, but then it occurred to me that no policy currently gives happiness to buildings you can have several of per system and we shouldn't start changing that now.
Imperator Knoedel
Simperator Knoedel
The AI really needs to escort its construction ships building Starbases. In my current game I got three Starbases for free by killing a New Earth Construction Ship that was one turn away from completing a Starbase, then finishing it myself without having to invest any gold.
Also Pirates OP plz nerf. It's ridiculous that they always get second tier Destroyers before anyone else.
Also Pirates OP plz nerf. It's ridiculous that they always get second tier Destroyers before anyone else.
