IOT Developmental Thread

Drake - Fictional character
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Power Play is a simple game, with a single resource, and a single goal. Power.

Background:
Earth is dead. Thanks to corruption, greed, and ignorance, the home of mankind had wasted away by the end of the 21st century. Through extreme luck and herculean effort, the human race was able to save itself, fleeing the solar system and establishing itself on a new world, Hemera. There mankind has rebuilt itself, at first banding together to tame their brave new world, and now they eye each other over lines in the sand.

Rules
The only ‘stat’ states use is Power. A state’s total Power (henceforth, State Power or SP) is determined by the total of the controlled provinces’ Power (henceforth, Province Power or PP). In addition, major (mostly player) states can control half of each controlled minor states’ SP.

Controlling minor states requires Influence. Having Influence equal to or greater than a minor state’s SP, as well as greater than the Influence of any other major state is required to maintain control.

Power Uses
Increase Province Power
: PP can be raised by 1 once a turn by paying 4x the PP at the start of the turn.
Invasion: A provinces defence is a number of d20 equal to double the province’s PP. You can use as many SP to attack a province as you desire, with 1 SP = 1d20. A successfully invaded province’s PP is reduced to 1. Invasions can only be done against neighbouring provinces, or across a single ocean territory. Invading across oceans gives the defender +1d20.
Influence: Use 5 SP to raise your influence in an NPC by 1.
Coup: Roll a d20 to change the influence of the controlling or leading state in a minor. The defense of a coup is equal to double the SP of the minor. You can dedicate as much SP as desired in a coup, with the effectiveness of a coup being a d20+SP. The resulting value is subtracted from the leading state’s influence, with any negative value being added to your own influence in the minor.
Sabotage: The equation is the same as an invasion, with a successful sabotage reducing PP to 1 and the saboteur remaining unknown. A failed sabotage will reveal the saboteur if lost by more than 10.

Power may also be used cooperatively. For example, player A may increase the PP of player B. During Invasions or Sabotage, the cooperating players’ SP is added together. Coups cannot be done cooperatively, but multiple coups may be launched against a single target.

The map is divided into six Regions. States in different regions have different bonuses and penalties against each other. Raising Influence in a different region requires double the SP. Defenders against Coups in different regions have double the defense. Invasions and Sabotage in different regions are unaffected.

Maps
Spoiler :
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I am vastly intrigued! :D

I will need to think about what to join as...
 
I'm going to give a wild guess that it's a reference to Francis Drake, famous privateer for the British, instead.
 
Yes, the character Nathan Drake is named for Francis Drake actually. The game looks very cool and I like the naming scheme of the continents very much, I was just making a joke because my immediate mental response was Nathan Drake.
 
Shameless self promotion time for Power Play. It's quick and easy to sign up, and is meant to be a simple, fast paced game set in a largely player designed scifi world. It will ideally be up and running in the next few days, so try to get in on the ground floor now
 
So, I want to run a !!!SpaceIOT!!! sometime this summer, preferably after either Black Comedy or Shadow of the Fall come to an end. Most likely will push Ekstera Universo back if Black Comedy/Shadow of the Fall maintain their current level of activity though.

Besides, I've failed in every setting except the Great Space IOT, so lets add that to the list.
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In 2050, scientists make a gigantic breakthrough in space technology which led to three major discoveries.

1. Certain black holes within the galaxy were linked together by wormholes, and ships equipped with Wei Drives can travel through these wormholes from point to point instantly. The map above shows these wormholes. In game terms, traveling through wormholes is a free action.

2. Star systems are often connected to one another with ley lines. By building a special structure called a Jump Gate at both ends of a ley line, a ship can travel between star systems almost instantly. Theoretically, a network of jump gates built across the galaxy could outmatch the network of wormholes. In game terms, traveling along activated ley lines is a free action.

3. Wei Drives can perform short-range jumps. Each hex jumped costs one action, and every ship in the game only has three. The nearest star system is four jumps away, so would take an entire year (one turn) and one additional action to reach. To best illustrate the advantage of jump gates over warp jumps, one of the star systems connected to Sol via a ley lines would take four years to reach via jumps, but can be reached instantly if jump gates were built at both ends.

In 2100, the Earth is still fragmented into nationstates. Nationstates, private companies, and NGOs are taking their first step into the stars with colonization and commerce in mind. The idea is this.

Do you want to escape Earth, migrating with your followers on a colony ship to a nearby star system in the hope of finding the promise land? You can.

Do you want to run a company dedicated to shipping, mining, industry, science, or even private security? You can.

Do you want to have a more traditional IOT experience and play as a country staking claims and establishing authority over star systems? You can.

Do you simply want to explore, discovering ley lines, planets, and other hidden fun stuff? You can.
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Many star systems will be home to planets and asteroids. There will be no planetary maps, but planets can be divided between multiple parties. Just because you settle a colony on a planet in Alpha Centauri doesn't mean somebody can't settle a colony on the other side of the planet.

I want the game to be a mix of Shadow of the Fall and Black Comedy, combining some of the former's mechanics with the latter's diversity of play and greater long-term potential.
 
This sounds really ambitious and interesting. I can't really comment on much until I see rules, but I'm already hyped. One question - will you let players design Earth nations or will you use pre-made nations?
 
Ekstera Universo Trade Garbage

Spoiler :
Enough rambling on Discord since I've organized my thoughts on trade a bit better.

As explained on Discord, star systems have worlds, and worlds are divided into regions (ala SysNES).

Trade and immigration are done through trade routes. I'm going to take an Earth (Sol) -> Chiron (Alpha Centauri) route for example.

The North American Union on Earth, a splattering of other nationstates, and a few companies build/devote ships with cargo space to trade between these two systems. The amount of resources and people that can be moved along this route depends on the total cargo potential. For this example, there total cargo potential between Sol and Alpha Centauri is 200, and the NAU government directly controls 50 of that. When the NAU needs stuff shipped between systems, as long as the shipments equal less than 50 units a turn, the NAU doesn't have to pay for the shipping outside the cost of the ships.

More than 50, the NAU has to pay for the privilege. The NAU could pay market rate, or pay a premium on the market rate to make sure its shipments get priority. If the total capacity of the route is 200, only 200 units of goods can be shipped a turn period! On the other hand, if the NAU doesn't need to use all 50 of its capacity, the rest of it automatically does trade work for whoever needs it.

What if player countries/corporations try to send more than 200 units along the route? The 200 units of goods are sent, and everything else after that is put in a backlog for next turn. If somebody swoops in and pays a bigger premium than you, it doesn't matter how far up the backlog you are though.

The plan is that besides player-ran countries and corporations building merchant fleets and establishing this capacity, the private sector on planets will attempt so as well if possible. A freshly settled agrarian world probably won't have the means to build freighters, but Earth most certainly be able to.

One last thing I'm trying to work out is travel/lead time. Automating a system so that resources purchased one turn don't arrive until a few turns later is sorta/kinda hard so instead, long-range routes have reduced cargo capacity, making jump gates very useful powerful.

Speaking of jump gates, jump gates will probably have a limit on the amount of ships that can pass through them a turn.

For example, Sol has one jump gate. One ley line runs from Sol to Alpha Centauri and another jump gate runs from Sol to Sirius. Each jump gate can handle, say, 200 cargo capacity.

If Sol needs to run 200 cargo to Alpha Centauri, Sirius shouldn't be able to get anything to Sol. This means the owners of jump gates (and multiple gates can be built in a system, and can have ownership shared) can certainly collect a fee/receive premiums. Again, automated so that players don't have to manage it if they don't want to. Again, building jump gates is going to be an expensive venture, so probably something only done by player countries/corporations/NGOs.

Still hammering out the details on all of this though.
 
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