Are journalists covering BE required to only ask bland/uninteresting questions?

[SupremacyKing2]

Alien factions. I don't care if they make them nonplayable, I want something more to contend with that frail puny hoooomans and space beetles.

I think it would be cool if the contact victory was tied in with the NPC alien factions. When a player activates the beacon, it would bring a "good" alien faction and 5 turns later, their enemy, the "evil" alien faction would also land. The BE factions would get caught in their war and would have to pick sides.

 

[Westwall]

That would be better than the current Contact victory.

Really almost anything would be better than the current victories.

 

[Lord Shadow]

I think it would be cool if the contact victory was tied in with the NPC alien factions. When a player activates the beacon, it would bring a "good" alien faction and 5 turns later, their enemy, the "evil" alien faction would also land. The BE factions would get caught in their war and would have to pick sides.

Isn't that essentially the two (overpowered) alien factions from SMACX?

I thought Beyond Earth's theme was humanity and its evolution in the face of an alien environment and ever-advancing technology.

Randomly throwing in intelligent alien species doesn't seem in tune with the rest of the game. We've got XCOM for that.

 

[Westwall]

"In tune with the rest of the game"?

Are we talking about the same game that has ruins, artifacts and even entire metropolises left over by intelligent aliens and a resources comically called "Firaxite"?

Yeah, wouldn't want to mess with that hard scientific "tune."

 

[KrikkitTwo]

"In tune with the rest of the game"?

Are we talking about the same game that has ruins, artifacts and even entire metropolises left over by intelligent aliens and a resources comically called "Firaxite"?

Yeah, wouldn't want to mess with that hard scientific "tune."

Hard sci fi is not the theme, Humanity is the theme. Alien factions are too far out of that theme. (Just like interplanetary travel is outside of theme of Civ)...therefore, you want actual interaction with aliens to be a victory condition rather than a mechanic.

 

[poom3619]

I guess it is up to anyone's interpretation to the game what this game should represent and what is the game's theme.

Someone with an idea and modding skill can make a new tune himself and mod in Borg, Grox, Jedi or Space Aztecs.

I think it would be cool if the contact victory was tied in with the NPC alien factions. When a player activates the beacon, it would bring a "good" alien faction and 5 turns later, their enemy, the "evil" alien faction would also land. The BE factions would get caught in their war and would have to pick sides.

I hardly call that victory. I mean, a player bring alien war to the planet and say they are the victor before siding with alien who can overpower them?

 

[NASAROG]

Y
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't the rumours already swirling that CiVI is set to drop some time next year? If that's accurate I wouldn't hold my breath for another expansion (never mind we've yet to see how BERT is received). Mind you I didn't think BE was gonna get any expansion in the first place, so hey.

I hope not. I'm not ready for civ6 just yet...

 

[SupremacyKing2]

I hardly call that victory. I mean, a player bring alien war to the planet and say they are the victor before siding with alien who can overpower them?

I just think that it makes sense to use the beacon to bring the alien NPC player into the game, since you already have an in-game mechanic where the factions successfully make contact with an advanced alien race. True, it would not really be a victory anymore. Perhaps, the beacon could be like a powerful wonder that grants the player 2 powerful unique techs that are not in the tech web. This would give the player who builds the beacon a powerful advantage to win the alien war and win by another victory.

 

[Westwall]

Hard sci fi is not the theme, Humanity is the theme. Alien factions are too far out of that theme.

Oh okay so dumb bug aliens led by a hivemind consciousness are in keeping with the theme of humanity but not struggling against an actual alien civilization. Yeah that's not arbitrary at all.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Hard sci fi is not the theme, Humanity is the theme. Alien factions are too far out of that theme.

Well, but the contact victory is all about making contact with an advanced alien race. And Rising Tide will have artifacts from this advanced alien race that the player can collect and use. Aliens are already in the game as a theme, so why not make them an actual civ that you can interact with?

 

[poom3619]

I just made a new thread in Idea and Suggestion forum on how an alien faction should be like. Note: Please don't post why we shouldn't have alien faction there.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=13985157#post13985157

I just think that it makes sense to use the beacon to bring the alien NPC player into the game, since you already have an in-game mechanic where the factions successfully make contact with an advanced alien race. True, it would not really be a victory anymore. Perhaps, the beacon could be like a powerful wonder that grants the player 2 powerful unique techs that are not in the tech web. This would give the player who builds the beacon a powerful advantage to win the alien war and win by another victory.

Sound like over-complicated victory for me, or an unofficial victory before tedious route to make it official (like Purity's victory),

if this was done by 1st score civ which outproduced or "out-affinity" everyone combined then it would like fighting a two-one war. If not that player but other player in a same game is then it will be four-player with one side rely on zerg rush. It sound like it will do nothing but putting everyone but superpower out of the game and fighting against other superpower.

 

[Lord Shadow]

Oh okay so dumb bug aliens led by a hivemind consciousness are in keeping with the theme of humanity but not struggling against an actual alien civilization. Yeah that's not arbitrary at all.

Animalistic aliens and more advanced yet passive artifacts and ruins serve as a background/secondary component, adding some colour to a story in which humanity remains the protagonist.

Throw in an active/playable alien civilization (somehow) on par with or more advanced than the human factions and they steal the spotlight the theme puts on our species.

Not to mention the fact most of the game's systems (especially the affinities) are geared towards humans, and the effort required to adapt them to sapient aliens would be colossal, enough to warrant a completely different game. That is, unless you just want to lazily rename/reskin affinities, virtues, buildings and techs, and pretend diplomacy, trade and espionage would work exactly the same with aliens as it does between humans. But I can't fathom how such extraterretrials would be remotely interesting.

 

[Galgus]

@Lord Shadow

That's a good summary of how progenitors would clash with the theme of Beyond Earth.

With affinities they would either not follow any of them, which would take the spotlight away from it, choose one, which would muddle their theme somewhat, or act like humans, in which case they may as well be humans.
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As an alternative to Aliens, I think late Sponsors could be far more interesting.

Before BE released it sounded like a late landing sponsor could really shake things up, but in practice they all land by the early game.

What if a sponsor could land in the mid-game with a strong military and powerful capital at the start, and quickly seek to expand?

They could either start with or rapidly adopt an affinity and really stir the pot as a wild card in the game.

Toss in more mid-game affinity wars, and that could make the mid-game far more interesting without breaking the theme.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

With affinities they would either not follow any of them, which would take the spotlight away from it, choose one, which would muddle their theme somewhat, or act like humans, in which case they may as well be humans.

It would make no sense for the progenitors to pick one of the core affinities. An alien race would need its own unique 4th affinity.

 

[Galgus]

So option 1, which would take the focus away from all of the existing affinities.

 

[GenEngineer]

It would make no sense for the progenitors to pick one of the core affinities. An alien race would need its own unique 4th affinity.

The trick here is how do you actually make it feel alien, and how do you make it work with the other affinities? If everything is in place for the main 3, then the aliens with a 4th that only they can get to the exclusion of the 3, how does it work mechanically? Why not just make it part of unique units and not bother with the affinity link?

From a flavor perspective, the more interesting question becomes how do you make the aliens feel sufficiently, well... Alien? As of now, we have 6 views of human society and ideology in the affinities and the hybrids, and an Alien perspective would need to be wildly and equally different from all of them. There's a fine line between "Too alien to relate to and understand" and "Not alien enough, seems like weird looking humans"

 

[SupremacyKing2]

The trick here is how do you actually make it feel alien, and how do you make it work with the other affinities? If everything is in place for the main 3, then the aliens with a 4th that only they can get to the exclusion of the 3, how does it work mechanically? Why not just make it part of unique units and not bother with the affinity link?

Perhaps, the best option would be to just give the alien faction their own unique units, unique abilities, etc that would represent their unique affinity. The other issue would be the tech web. The game is set up that affinities come mainly through the tech web but the tech web only relates to techs that humans would pursue. So, you can't connect the current techs with a 4th alien affinity. Ideally, the aliens would need their own unique tech web too. This is probably why from a gameplay perspective, an alien race does not work as a playable race. The other solution could be for an alien race not to get affinity points via techs at all. This could make playing the alien race really different strategy wise from the human civs.

 

[Barathor]

If we're talking about "playable" alien factions, I agree with Lord Shadow. I would never like to see that, personally.

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Though, I don't really see any issues with NPC antagonist aliens mid-late game to raise the stakes of things. The emphasis is still on humanity.

A few examples:

Do you continue to fight your old foes, or do you suddenly join forces with them to take on the new, greater threat against all humanity?

Do you wait and let them destroy some of your "competitors" then take them on?

After eliminating the new threat, does your old foe suddenly want to become your ally? Do you want to be theirs?

Also, perhaps there aren't any wars going on and everybody is too comfortable during the later half of the game while turtling and trading away with each other. Antagonist alien cities making planetfall throughout the map and challenging players would be very welcome to shake things up.

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OR....

We introduce Marauders to the game which start appearing mid game. They basically behave like the barbarians of Civ. (There's already a precedent for this in Starships.)

Flavor-wise, these are the rebels, criminals, and such of the factions which separate from them (or maybe some are even exiled) -- the colonies aren't squeaky clean cities, there's always crime and corruption.

All marauders are under one black banner and symbol, like barbarians, and behave like its own team.

They spawn from station-like cities which appear in the fog of maps, maybe they can be called hideouts are something, instead of camps. Coastal/Water hideouts spawn naval versions of marauders (pirate ships!).

Also...

Perhaps things can be introduced for bonuses with stations for protecting them against the marauders. (Like Civ 5, haha)

Actually, I think I'm liking this simpler idea more than having NPC aliens.

 

[Galgus]

I think that could be done more interestingly with mid-game human factions landing on the planet with a formidable capital, army, and technology.

It would feel a bit like playing Civ 5 with your ideology and some ideological rivals, when suddenly new powerful nations appear where a few are friendly to you, but most are hostile.

The diplomatic landscape would shift, and the player would suddenly need to respond to new threats and opportunities.
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I kind of like the idea of Marauders, but I'm not sure how they would get the tools they needed.

Perhaps players could secretly bribe and supply them to cause deniable trouble for their rivals?

 

[poom3619]

The trick here is how do you actually make it feel alien, and how do you make it work with the other affinities? If everything is in place for the main 3, then the aliens with a 4th that only they can get to the exclusion of the 3, how does it work mechanically? Why not just make it part of unique units and not bother with the affinity link?

From a flavor perspective, the more interesting question becomes how do you make the aliens feel sufficiently, well... Alien? As of now, we have 6 views of human society and ideology in the affinities and the hybrids, and an Alien perspective would need to be wildly and equally different from all of them. There's a fine line between "Too alien to relate to and understand" and "Not alien enough, seems like weird looking humans"

It would make no sense for the progenitors to pick one of the core affinities. An alien race would need its own unique 4th affinity.

Why not? I imagine alien may be finding a way to rebuild, and there may be good faction and bad faction of aliens which highlight the affinity's good and bad application, So Good and Bad Harmony Alien would ideologically the same with SMAC's.

Bad Purity would just conquer/terraform like Scrin in C&C,

and Bad Supremacy want to build a supreme AI under their control.

and Good Purity and Supremacy alien would use their affinity in seemingly good way with steak of "Alien" morality to stop the bad one.