IOT Developmental Thread

[gay_Aleks]

"There is only the Emperor,
and he is our Shield and Protector."

Imperium of Man​

IoM is a turn-based game centered within the Warhammer 40k universe inspired by such incredible games as: "Fallen Star" and "Botwawki". With storytelling being a focus of the game the player takes the role of a local planetary ruler in shackled vassalage to the Imperium of Man. As selected governor you're either willingly, or not, wearing the choking leash of the cold and bureaucratic imperium and is forced to pay yearly tithes, taxes and military manpower to the tyrannical galactic superpower you now serve. All are, on paper, answering directly to the loyalist and imperial representative faction of House Antaris, led by high governor Aurun delle Antaris. As the game progresses you may choose to remain a loyalist to the imperium, declare your independence and free your people, or find other and more "unnatural" solutions for your problems.

The game features

• Politics in the sci-fi feudal space-future: Intense and mind-boggling political intrigues and in-fighting between multiple unique factions for every world.
• Epic battles: The power to send thousands upon marching thousands of poor souls to their grotesque deaths in battlefields across multiple solar systems.
• Technological mysteries: Explore dead, forbidden and/or long-forgotten worlds to discover long-lost technologies that may destroy worlds, if not entire systems, if reactivated.
• Heresy: The great enemy within is everywhere and one must always be on the lookout for the signs, lest their world becomes one giant blood orgy.
  
• There is only War: British hooligan orcs in space kill everyone they find, super-secretive space elves kill everyone they find, crazy magical storms make everyone they come across mad and heretical, hyper-xenophobic space humans kill everyone they find. GOOD TIMES, GOOD VIBES.

I swear if this time you do the same thing as last time

 

[Decamper]

Do it zapp, do iiiiiiiiiiit.

 

[Sonereal]

Well, since I PM'd you and you haven't edited it.

I'd like a platoon of "exotic Nod Flame Thanks" please and than you. What's their stats?

Still WIP.

The Flame Tank, versus other tanks, is hilariously weak. However, the Engineering class makes the Flame Tank very useful when attacking entrenched GDI positions or defending said positions against GDI attacks. The armor class is icing on the cake. Finally, because DTFTs are sorta death traps, the troops crewing them are fanatics (not pictured).



The usual caveat is that, outside of attacking entrenched positions, it is a mixed bag. It is weaker than either variant of Nod's Light Tank (one is a M2 Bradley IFV with troop carrying capacity reduced in favor of a bigger gun and more strength), and while it might be able to man handle infantry units in open combat (as opposed to siege combat and city fighting), it wouldn't take that many GDI Riflemen supported by an AT4 to take down a Flame Tank.

Like most Nod units, it lacks night vision, though that can be added for a small increase in cost and upkeep.

 

[Omega124]

So, remember throughout the past school year, I proposed three distincitly different IOTs, and said I'd run one when summer came? Well, summer came. And I like each idea, and I don't know which one I'll pursue.

So, I decided to run a poll. This is not just a "I'll do whatever gets the most votes" poll though. Popularity will be a big factor in which game I'll pursue, but I also want to know why people voted for what game. So, if people vote for one IOT, but for reasons I don't want to run that IOT, but I'm in tune with the people who voted for second place, I'll go with second place. Basically, I want to avoid the mistake of FemIOT and have a game where both me and my players are on the same page of what we want.

If these IOTs aren't familar, I'll recap them.

Paradox: This is an IOT based off one of my favorite shared universes ever created, simply called Paradox. Paradox takes place in the Red Alert universe, and is in many ways a deconstruction of what would happen if you took the events of Red Alert and applied reality to them. In 1969, America is plunged into a second civil war after the international community assassinated their president, China just rose into international prominence after developing nuclear weapons, and Vietnam is the current site of a giant proxy war that the entire world has a stake in one way or the other. The Soviet Union and Japan represent the strongest single nations, although most of Europe is part of a political bloc that is increasingly starting to federalize.

I say based because I will not be following the lore 100% in order to make it more appealing for a game based on geopolitics than an aborted RTS. Some factions, like China, will have their lore significantly altered so that they better fit into the rest of the world. Others, like Talon or the Protectorate, will be cut entirely, for they really don't fit the theme of this game. After deliberation, I feel like I will keep some of the fantastic technology featured after all, because I also want this, in a way, to be Gone is the Old Guard 2, which also featured silly science fiction in an otherwise serious geopolitical simulator.

Every nation that's mentioned in the lore will be playable, with pre-defined nations like an old-school NES. Some nations will be more important than others. These aren't just the superpowers, but any nation that currently has something "major" going on:

American Confederacy (aka the USA)
Allied America (aka the USA)
UK
France
German Empire (West Germany)
Italy (currently under effective control of the Mediterranean Syndicate, but also nominally still part of the Allies)
Soviet Union
Empire of Japan
Kingdom of China
Australia
North Vietnam
South Vietnam
GLA (Playable NGO)
Kingdom of Yugoslavia (Under effective control of the Cult of the Black Hand, led by a mysterious man known only as Kane...)

The Golden Land: This IOT is based off of Zelda, particularly the fanmod Hyrule Total War. This IOT's main "goal" is to simulate both the internal politics of a massive realm, and perhaps even its collaspe in the wake of invasion. At the beginning of the game, there will be a giant Kingdom of Hyrule, ruled by the monarchy (which would be played by the player). However, this kingdom would be subdivided into regions, controlled by subfactions. Each subfaction will be playable in its own right, and players are encouraged to try to cooperate with each other and the king... as long as it benefits them. There also starts some neighboring countries, unified and envious of Hyrule's fertile land, who would want nothing more but to carve some of the land for themselves. As the invasions start pouring in from every direction, it will become impossible for the monarchy to effectively respond to every threat, and through the chaos, some Hyrulean regions might want to declare independence, or even take the throne for themselves...

A list of factions that will be playable:

Hyrule:
Kingdom of Hyrule
Sheikah Cadre
Order of Wizzrobes
Order of the Golden Land
Ordona Province
Layranu Province
Koriki Forest
Death Mountain (AKA the Goron Tribes)
Lake Hylia (AKA the Zora Dominion)

Invaders:
Moblins
River Zoras
Gohma
Stalfos
Lizalfos

Rival Kingdoms (AKA civilized invaders):
Geurdo Tribes
Darknut Legion
Deku Kingdom
Labyranna Reigme

There will also be some NPCs representing non-invading minor races that can be interacted with, along with some possible surprise invaders

The Sky Calls to Us: This IOT takes place a few hundred years in the future. The EM Drive was a success, but FTL remains outside of humanity's grasp. Cheap and affordable interstellar travel has led to the outer Solar System being colonized, particularly Mars. Earth still massively outnumbers her colonies, but her ecosystem is dying due to climate change and unfettered capitalism. The rest of the solar system has rejected Earth's "neo"liberal order, with communist Mars, ancap Ceres, and the idealistic democratic "Galilean Union" just being a few examples of the colonial societies. With Earth dying, the rest of the colonies are on a crossroads of either trying to stand with each other and reform the Solar Federation, or to forcefully try to break free from Earth. Sol will never be the same again.

A fair warning, The Sky Calls to Us would have a very small player limit. There's not a lot of planned factions, which are:

United Nations of Earth
(Venus Prison)
Commune of Mars
Ceres
Galilean Union
Saturnian Republic of Titan
Saturnian Republic of Enceladus
State of Triton
Holy Pluto

So, after listening to this info dump, here is the link to the poll:

https://goo.gl/forms/K5ickhk5JkLRHGQl1

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Currently abstaining because while these all sound nifty in their own right, I can never commit to a game until I know the actual ruleset, and that's probably not gonna follow until you've picked the game.

Kingdom of China

#triggered

 

[Omega124]

Currently abstaining because while these all sound nifty in their own right, I can never commit to a game until I know the actual ruleset, and that's probably not gonna follow until you've picked the game.


#triggered

It is neither New nor Eternal, don't worry.

(it also would have an Empress and we all know christos doesn't make female characters ;D )

 

[Decamper]

​

In 2050, humanity is clawing itself out of The Troubles, a twenty year period of social, political and environmental chaos kicked off by the brief yet horrifying Third World War. People once again come together under the banner of progress and safety. They say this time will be different. They say humanity has been reborn. We will see.

*​

In Tensei, players will create and lead their polity through a resurging global community. Ideology, technology, and economy are just as connected to your neighbours as warfare is, and any decisions you make for your own polity will affect the rest of the globe.

*​

The game will begin with a 3 round period from 2049 to 2064, during which players will be given a set amount of points each turn to use for claiming provinces or improving their already held provinces or polity stats. By the end of these 3 rounds, the map will be filled with player and NPC polities, and then the regular rounds will begin with the full stats sheet and rule set.

*​

The stats are finished, I’m currently just writing out the rules in a way that is hopefully understandable. A thread could very well show up within a few days. For now, here is the map I’ll be working with. Credit to JK Stockholme and TK for the map, with some slight modifications by me. While I’m trying to keep the province number reasonable, I’m open to adding some more provinces if anyone desperately wants them.

​

 

[Terran Empress]

oh my, could I request a pm when thsi starts so i can make sure I can join

 

[Decamper]

oh my, could I request a pm when thsi starts so i can make sure I can join

Done and done.

 

[CivOasis]

Mechanics. Can provide examples if people would appreciate them; also interested in feedback on 1) if this is easy to read and understand 2) if this seems like intuitive enough gameplay 3) if this sounds like fun gameplay
Would be used for an alt-hist premade world, if it runs, will likely be the closest thing to a traditional IOT I've run in... well, possibly ever.

 

[inthesomeday]

Have there been any IOTs about a zombie apocalypse? As in, you play as nations and dictate policies trying to prevent the spread of the virus.

In fact that could be just stage one. Stage two could be small-scale polities on some regional scale trying to rebuild.

Just wondering if there's ever been anything like that.

 

[Crezth]

Greetings comrades,

I would like to present some of my thinking on what I call "the political problem" of stratego-historical roleplaying games. I have created a short Python script to practically illustrate the mechanisms I envision in this regard.

Spoiler :

#this is yvh_values.py, an initialization script for the Yevheniya system (in-progress)
#for simulating political parties, elections, transfer of power, and more for
#historical games.
#Yevheniya is created by Crezth and is open-source

#this is a dummy class
class basicElement:
def __init__(self, arg):
self.arg = arg

#this is the basic class for values, or ideas, which form the foundation of
#eventual "ideologies." a single value has a name and a description, and each
#usually has one or multiple incompatible values. For instance, militarism is
#generally incompatible with pacifism, so a single Ideology cannot coherently
#include both (when ideologies disobey this rule they are called "Incoherent").
#However, Political Parties, which are more complex machines, can and do easily
#accommodate this discrepancy, and can be founded by several ideologies, even
#those with conflicting values.
class Value(basicElement):
def __init__(self, name, description):
self.name = name
self.description = description

#the Basic Set of the Values is given here. Generally, the incompatible value is
#the next option for each choice. The first four options are the "authority"
#values and these are unique in that they are all mutually incompatible.
values_array = []
values_array.append(Value('Egalitarianism','Belief that people should be treated equally or fairly.'))
values_array.append(Value('Authoritarianism','Belief that authority should be obeyed.'))
values_array.append(Value('Anarchism','Belief that all authority is immoral.'))
values_array.append(Value('Synarchism','Belief that harmony is paramount.'))
values_array.append(Value('Spiritualism','Belief that perception begats reality.'))
values_array.append(Value('Materialism','Belief that reality begats perception.'))
values_array.append(Value('Militarism','Belief in force, power, and domination.'))
values_array.append(Value('Pacifism','Belief in peace, accord, and development.'))
values_array.append(Value('Conservationism','Belief in conserving resources and living within means.'))
values_array.append(Value('Capitalism','Belief in consuming resources, growth, and expansion.'))
values_array.append(Value('Collectivism','Belief in human unity and public property.'))
values_array.append(Value('Individualism','Belief in human rationalia and private enterprise.'))
values_array.append(Value('Nativism','Belief in the superiority of familiar things.'))
values_array.append(Value('Cosmopolitanism','Belief in the superiority of unfamiliar things.'))

# don't mind this: this just creates a dictionary object so i can easily
# look up the variables later
values_dic = {}
for value in values_array:
values_dic[value.name] = value
vd = values_dic

# the ideology class consists of one or multiple values, a name, and a description
class Ideology:
def __init__(self, in_values, name_in, description=''):
self.name = name_in
self.description = description
self.values = []
for value in in_values: self.values.append(value)

# the Party class has one (or more) ideologies it represents, a name, and goals
# also important are descriptions of their power-bases, and allied parties
# Party class entities are political and the primary actors of the YVH module
class Party:
def __init__(self, ideologies_in, name_in, description='', allies_in=[]):
self.name = name_in
self.description = description
self.values = []
self.allies = allies_in
self.ideologies = ideologies_in
for ideology in self.ideologies:
for value in ideology.values:
if not value in self.values:
self.values.append(value)
def print_ideologies(self):
for idea in self.ideologies:
print(idea.name+': '+idea.description)
def omniprint(self):
print(self.name+': '+self.description)
self.print_ideologies()

#An example: Grand Ole' Party

#first we need an ideology. let's choose "fiscal conservatism"
#first step will be choosing the values and putting it in an array. let's pick
#Individualism, Capitalism, and Egalitarianism. This reflects Fiscal Conservatives'
#focus on deregulation, free enterprise, and real investment. The order in which
#they are listed also reflects their priorities.

fiscon_ideas = [vd['Individualism'], vd['Egalitarianism'], vd['Capitalism']];
FISCON = Ideology(fiscon_ideas, 'Fiscal Conservatism', 'The Fiscal Conservatives believe that deregulated, free markets and government austerity are key to sound fiscal policy, and see much at stake in reckless spending.')

#Now we have created the FISCON Ideology object. This object will allow us to
#refer to FISCON and its values whenever we need. Since this is an ideology, it
#may be applied to many parties, although we are only going to be applying it to
#the GOP in this example. (Note FISCON should be put in brackets, like an array.)

GOP = Party([FISCON], 'Grand Old Party', 'The GOP is the party of Lincoln and Republicans. Lowered social services, aggressive foreign policy, and deregulation of the economy are their primary issues.')

#We have created GOP and we have created it with the FISCON ideology guiding it.
#In the initialization process, the values of FISCON will also translate to the
#values of the GOP. However, perhaps you think we need another ideology to appro-
#priately represent the GOP. Political parties, especially large ones in FPTP
#systems, alliances, coalitions, or leagues, can have multiple ideologies - some
#of them even in conflict. So, let's also put the FISCON's sworn enemy: the NEOCON.

neocon_ideas = [vd['Militarism'], vd['Capitalism'], vd['Authoritarianism'], vd['Spiritualism']];
NEOCON = Ideology(neocon_ideas, "Neo-Conservatism", "The Neo-Conservatives believe a new world order is nigh and seek to usher it in on the tip of America's spear, willing to sacrifice much treasure and blood for the glory of the military and the security of the nation.")

#Now we re-create the GOP party but add the NEOCON ideology in an array with FISCON:

GOP = Party([FISCON, NEOCON], 'Grand Old Party', 'The GOP is the party of Lincoln and Republicans. Lowered social services, aggressive foreign policy, and deregulation of the economy are their primary issues.')

#Now we can see the GOP's ideologies:

GOP.omniprint()

#Another example: the Democratic National Convention.

#the first ideology will be "neoliberalism", and be cosmopolitan, synarchist, individualist, and capitalist.
#the second ideology will be "social liberalism", and be egalitarian, collectivist, and pacifist.
#the third ideology, just to spice things up, will be "radical greens" and be conservationist, collectivist, and pacifist.

neolib_ideas = [vd['Cosmopolitanism'], vd['Synarchism'], vd['Individualism'], vd['Capitalism']];
soclib_ideas = [vd['Egalitarianism'], vd['Collectivism'], vd['Pacifism']];
radgrn_ideas = [vd['Conservationism'], vd['Militarism'], vd['Collectivism']];
NEOLIB = Ideology(neolib_ideas, 'Neo-Liberalism', "The Neo-Liberals are those who seek to elevate and embrace the global economy, and through non-violent pressures and diplomacy seek to spread free markets everywhere.")
SOCLIB = Ideology(soclib_ideas, 'Social Liberalism', "The Social Liberals believe that society has a responsibility to its weakest and poorest, and that a good society has wealth which is evenly distributed throughout.")
RADGRN = Ideology(radgrn_ideas, 'Radical Greens', "The Radical Greens are interested in aggressive sanctions and piracy against those who pollute the earth and lobby ferociously for stronger measures to protect the environment and halt global warming.")

#bring it together like we did before:

DNC = Party([NEOLIB, SOCLIB, RADGRN], 'Democratic National Convention', 'The DNC is the party of FDR and Democrats. Increased social services, increased international commerce, social justice, and sensible conservationist policy are their primary issues.')

DNC.omniprint()

This script can be executed with the latest version of Python 3 and will only print out the contents of the two "Party" objects which are used to represent individual political parties. It is not necessary to run or understand this script, but I hope you will find it easy to follow along with the comments.

The basic idea of the system is that there is a set of philosophical ideas or Values which are atomic. This is a debatable notion, but is modeled after the Stellaris model of ethoses. I remember NinjaCow has done work on expanding the Stellaris ethos system to include a more diverse set of ethoses, which I think is a good idea in general; however I also saw an advantage in maintaining a polar system. I have therefore proposed a set of 14 values which can be divided into 6 groups:

Authority: [Egalitarianism, Authoritarianism, Anarchism, Synarchism]
Epistemology: [Spiritualist, Materialist]
Force: [Militarism, Pacifism]
Resources: [Conservationism, Capitalism]
Property: [Collectivism, Individualism]
Tradition: [Nativism, Cosmopolitanism]

Now, these values can be collected in any combination within an Ideology, which combines those values in order to produce a view of the political world: of what is moral and immoral, right and wrong, and what are the nature of politics itself. The Ideology can then be measured according to the values it has.

What is the advantage of this system? How is this different than Stellaris? In Stellaris, the Ideology of the ruling party is held inviolate by the entire nation. The governing ethics are codified, somehow, like in an immortal Constitution. Stellaris then determines government popularity based on how many of those ethics are also valued by the population. The population's ethics can shift over time. Their ethics determine their membership in a "faction" that has some amount of support or non- for the government.

I feel this is a good place to start because population-based models allow for the modeler to understand how the political capacity for action relates to individual peoples' feelings. So, instead of having the population favor the government and its monolithic ethic directly, they favor ideologies which are espoused by Parties. Those parties which espouse ideologies that are wholly or partially like an individual's ideology will be most attractive to that individual. This also allows for complex alliances between partially competitive ideologies within the same Party.

There are a few ways we can make this more interesting, too. Let's consider the election mechanisms in nations like the United States and the Current Republic of France. In a first-past-the-post system, only two political parties seem to dominate; whereas in a multi-stage election system as in France, several parties are competitive and typically cooperate in Parliament. Hence we would be able to impose a restriction for the US' political parties by only allowing two of them to command most of the vote (each must get between 40 and 60%, say, of the vote), meaning those parties need to jockey more severely and more broadly for ideological influence. Therefore we can distinguish between a broad brand of different political parties with unique ideologies.

I am interested next in investigating how to track influence on a national level and the changes of a nation's political opinions and behaviors over time. In my opinion, influence is a mixture of political (how much power has been secured), ideological (how much the hearts and minds of the people support it), and inertial (how hard it is to oppose them).

Thanks for reading,

-C

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Have there been any IOTs about a zombie apocalypse? As in, you play as nations and dictate policies trying to prevent the spread of the virus.

In fact that could be just stage one. Stage two could be small-scale polities on some regional scale trying to rebuild.

Just wondering if there's ever been anything like that.

Well there was a game by Domination3000 (GhostWriter16) ages ago about a zombie apocalypse, but it was more a gimmick than a core element and he axed it shortly after launch.

Civ'ed is actually working on a Napoleonic-themed zombie game as we speak.

 

[Ailedhoo]

If there is a zombie game: can I used the ultimate horror weapon against them?

 

[NinjaCow64]

@Crezth: Interesting. Could you possibly upload the Python as an actual file as opposed to text?

I really like the idea of political parties representing multiple ideologies. I feel like it might be better to reconstruct Authority to maybe make another group so that each group has two polar opposites. Interested to see what comes of this.

 

[Crezth]

@NinjaCow64 : Sure, I did not want to cold-upload a .py file because those are (and of a right are acknowledged to be) insecure, but since you asked I'll save it in pure text and upload it here. Just change the file type to .py if you want to use it.

My thinking with Authority is that most people who have an opinion on authority are somewhere between egalitarian and authoritarian, but there is also a strong political tradition of rejecting authority entirely (anarchism) or synchronizing it completely with society (the "harmonious government" or synarchistic view). I admit the latter point is a bit of indulgence on my part, but I do feel there needs to be some way to distinguish between common monarchies and political oligarchies. In this sense Authoritarianism can be conceived as the "A multitude of rulers is not a good thing... let there be one ruler, one King." and Synarchism is then "There is a natural harmony linking man, the earth, and heaven." The other term for this category of values could be "Legitimacy."

 

[NinjaCow64]

Thanks Crezth! I guess the point I was making is that you could possibly seperate the parts about the induvidual's relationship to society (Synarchism[?]/Anarchism) and how democratic said society should be (Authoritarianism[?]/Egalitarianism). I mean that might get into some weird territory though with some weird combo like Authortarian Anarchism. I'll have to think about it some more.

 

[Crezth]

I almost feel those issues are resolved in the Property group, hence you can have Anarchist Collectivism and Authoritarian Individualism. However, I guess I see what you're getting at. I suppose in principle you could assume Anarchism and Synarchism are more idealistic than achievable, and you could branch them under Egalitarian or Authoritarian and mixtures with other ideas. I think that a version of the system would still be coherent and functional if you eliminated Anarchism/Synarchism.

 

[inthesomeday]

Authoritarianism is not the opposite of egalitarianism.

 

[Crezth]

[sigh] What do you mean by that exactly?