C2C - Aliens

[Dancing Hoskuld]

On Alien barbarians, I need these for a couple of things. Before we had multi-maps it was suggested that one civ be held aside for these since they need to be different in a number of ways from normal barbarians. Not the least being ignoring the Great Wall. The only problem was that the units would be disbanded if there was not a city for that nation.

So would it work to have a non-growing city on one of the other maps that is the pseudo city for these barbarians.

This would allow other stuff to be implemented to:-

• slave uprisings with units
• jacharies(sp?) serf uprisings
• Early alien invasions like H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds".

 

[Hydromancerx]

I'll just say that I'm in favor of having a wide variety of Alien species and of them being civs of varying development once you reach spacefaring yourself. There's likely to be reptilian, raptor-like species, a variety of insectoids, an Octopus-like species or two, some other 'near-humans', swarm-like hive minds, Avians, even draconians and gellyfish style races. Nearly all forms of life have the potential to develop high intelligence and the means of reaching spacefaring technologies must vary greatly from external (technological) means to internal (psychic) or biological (evolutionary) methods that allow for space travel and outer world colonization. Not all should just be barbarians and the politics should be complex beyond all earthly comprehension.

I would like there to be just one intelligent alien race. Their appearance would remain a mystery so not to fall into Earth stereotypes of anything Earth-like. While we could have rare planets with alien life we should keep the intelligent one limited to one very powerful alien species. Possibly from another galaxy or at least the far side of the galaxy to help explain why they never never visited Earth during your game.

Interaction should be very difficult since everything about them would be alien to us. Being "benevolent" would not be fun for game play so a "malevolent" alien race would be much more fun for the end game challenge. It also helps to explain why they are the only race you encounter since any other alien race is already destroyed by them.

 

[KwisatzHaderach]

I would suggest now with Multi-maps, that colonies far out should eventually start to break off. This would cause galactic civil war, groups evolving divergently, even possible attacks on the home planet. I also think that is should be possible for machines to take charge, probably some time in the Transhuman era. I personally think this idea along with Hydromancers shadowy overlord species is all that would be needed in space.

I do especially think so on the robots that would make entering the galactic era much harder.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Well if we have revolutions on we can always make it very difficult to have an empire that spans the starts. Techs like Galactic Federation would be key to keeping a stable empire that spanned the galaxy.

 

[LumenAngel]

I m not sure if it is a good idea, but I love "human-like aliens".
S why not, in another maps, 2-3 "alien" civs, like humans civ, with these restrction :
- They cant build world wonders (world wonders will recquire Culture (Humans), that will be present in all earth civ.). They will maybe have "special" wonders for them (that will require Culture (Aliens))
- Their palace will give free ****punk ressource. They are differents, and the special building will help them to devellop without wonders
- They have no need to terraform, but they can alienform others planets (so, the units able to terraform will require Culture (human), and the one able to alienform Culture (alien))

 

[Thunderbrd]

I'm happy to wait to see how things pan out under H's plan before suggesting anything further there and perhaps a modmod would be the way to introduce 'Alien Civs'. It'd be a serious development project.

But I also think its unlikely humanity would greatly explore space before Globalization occurs. And not everyone likes to play with Rev (though I might suggest making it mandatory and enforcing that we balance out that system if we're going to go about it this way.)

 

[KwisatzHaderach]

To: Hydromancerx

Exactly, in the very beginning of our days of space exploration, when we send out colony ships we will lose contact, be unable to reach a new colony we do have contact with for extended periods of time, or just anger colonist through colonialist tactics. One example being the British towards
the U.S.

It would happen about the time outlier colonies (an area on the map where it is either of enormous cost to transport, or extremely long transport times) started to become self sufficient.

My whole point is that the majority of the aliens we meet in the next twenty thousand years will probably share common ancestry with us. Ex. If a human was born on Mars they would be Martian not Terran. I think genetic adaptation to environment should be accounted for.

 

[Hydromancerx]

To: Hydromancerx

Exactly, in the very beginning of our days of space exploration, when we send out colony ships we will lose contact, be unable to reach a new colony we do have contact with for extended periods of time, or just anger colonist through colonialist tactics. One example being the British towards
the U.S.

It would happen about the time outlier colonies (an area on the map where it is either of enormous cost to transport, or extremely long transport times) started to become self sufficient.

My whole point is that the majority of the aliens we meet in the next twenty thousand years will probably share common ancestry with us. Ex. If a human was born on Mars they would be Martian not Terran. I think genetic adaptation to environment should be accounted for.

This is exactly what I was thinking. We don't need any aliens because we already will be making our own aliens. Be it human, robotic or uplifted animal. We already have Cetacean Sapien (aka Uplifted Dolphins) as a culture in the mod when you get up to Species Uplifting tech.

Like I said in the other topics, having true aliens is too hard to do. All you end up with are things that end up resembling stuff from Earth anyways. The end game alien will be ambiguous and terrifying. It will be super powerful and want to wipe out everything.

Its more of a game mechanic than anything. Something to give you a challenge at the end of the game when you are getting godly powers yourself.

Don't get me wrong I love sci-fi aliens and have even run a project called Sagan 4 where you are evolving an alien ecosystem one species at a time. But even I know better than to assume that any alien we meet will look like us.

 

[LumenAngel]

All you end up with are things that end up resembling stuff from Earth anyways.

That can be a "no problem".
having some new unearthed civ coming in your full map, using "terraform nuke"-like weapons, with maybe already some colony on moon can be as challenging as to be the invaders, finding a planet with earth-like civs, maybe a little lower in tech tahn you, but alreasy impleted in this planet and truly able to defend it.
Maybe you will be equals, an while you try to invade them, they will try to invade you.

Having a far superior invasion in earth is not the dream of everyone...

 

[Hydromancerx]

Well by the time they come into the game you will most likely be fighting them on the Galactic map and not Earth, the moon or Mars. If they make it to the solar system then your probably screwed.

 

[LumenAngel]

Maybe yes, maybe no. They can have their own revo/crime/global warming/dark hole problem, maybe they use a lot of inivisible units and come too close, maybe they prefer playing hide and seek (espionage) than global war...

it's like when another continent come with gallion when you are happy with decaramene. It will be hard, but not impossible. And the contrary : its not because you have the best army and able to invade that you will win the war : unhapiness and cost from war and units are for everyone, alien too.

In my actual game, Egyptian have far more cities, are better in tech and have a better army. But they have lot of golds problem and me and persian spam them with rogue-lie units and spy.

 

[Nimek]

Note that before you reach galatic era you will have huge empire on earth. SO space exploration and alens must be something that make game worth to play. So alians sould be:

- superior
- hard to destroy
- very dangerous
- like hydro post is 1 post in these thread

FOr example when you mmet aliens on mars (with one mars city) it is obvious that you should build a lot of units on earth and send them to mars (like speceship troopers the movie).

Edit

I would love too see bug like aliens (from spaceship troopers)

 

[Hydromancerx]

@Nimek

There will not be Mars aliens. There might be rebel barbarians but not aliens.

Again true aliens will be very end game. If you do find other alien life it will be non-sentient and probably represented as a resource. Such as you find alien fauna or flora. However true alien life will be VERY rare.

However stuff spawned from humans won't be. We can have rebel humans, pirate humans, rogue robots, different sub-species of humans. The possibilities are endless. And also quite plausible.

 

[Nimek]

@Hydro

1What about red fungi idea from first post ?? will stay?

2 If there will be no aliens so what will make game fun to play when player will be superior on earth and there will no threats in space?

 

[Hydromancerx]

1. Probably.

2. In the Galactic Era near the end game there WILL be the superior alien race.

On Mars or the Moon, no. There will be barbarians that spawn on the Moon and Mars and even Space based on Earth cultures just like they do on the Earth maps. Depending upon your settings new cultures will spawn from the Barbarian cities and if revolutions are on then they can break off since keeping colonies on other planets will be exponentially harder the farther away from Earth you get. Such a Lunar Colonies are easier to keep than Martian ones. Likewise ones in other solar systems will be even harder.

We can also have events where non-human things break off such as robots, sentient animals and even sub-species of humans. One big problem in current late game is that there is no room to expand on Earth. This all changes when you unlock each new map since its that much more space for factions to grow in.

 

[LumenAngel]

2 If there will be no aliens so what will make game fun to play when player will be superior on earth and there will no threats in space?

I think I just nderstand why I m disagree with Hydro (ans lot of others).
If you totally domante Earth and earth is stille livable, OK.

But maybe all games wont finish like this. On some, Earth will be nothing but dunes and salt plain, no ressource (because of depletion), only 1 or 2 civ trying to survive here while others terraform Mars.

2 or more civs can co-dominate Earth, or one domainte the Earth and an other planet, making all galactica Era like actual mediaval/Renaissance era : a big race to better units, new land and ressource.

In the first case, these aliens will ruin the fun : the game would be about survive and create a better (or not) world, or at least, not destroy this one. In the second case, a no-diplomacy alien will be boring : the luckiest (the last attacked) will survive

 

[Mouthwash]

Shouldn't these alien be optional?

 

[Randomness]

From what I understand, these aliens won't start showing up until the player has mastered solar colonization, so this will be the final challenge in the game, after all available space is taken up and the player is on the final leg of the tech tree. Basically, if you manage to survive, you'll have finished the game.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Think of the end game alines like the neanderthals of space. Except much more aggressive and dangerous. And yes they will not show up until you have solar system colonization technology. Any sooner and it would be much too hard to fight them.

 

[Mouthwash]

When will they be released?