Mod idea: Star Trek

[bky1701]

Here is the overview of my idea, I am posting this as… I need help, I can do a lot, but not all of this, on my own.

Civs and leaders:

Note: Traits do NOT mean the same thing as they do in unmodded Civ4, there are also more of them.

The traits listed are only an idea, input in welcome.

United Federation of Planets:
Jonathan Archer (Expansionist, Scientific)
Jaresh-Inyo (Industrious, Scientific)

Klingon Empire:
Duras (Militaristic, Treacherous)
Gowron (Militaristic, Honorable)
K'mpec (Industrious, Honorable)
Kahless (Honorable, Philosophical)

Romulan Star Empire:
Neral (Treacherous, Scientific)
Shinzon (Treacherous, Expansionist)

Ferengi Alliance:
Quark (Financial, Creative)
Gint (Financial, Philosophical)
Rom (Financial, Scientific)
Zek (Financial, Industrious)
(Don’t ask why they get more then everyone else, I don’t know)

Cardassian Union:
Dukat (Militaristic, Industrious)

The Dominion:
Founder (Expansionist, Militaristic)
(They don’t have names…(?))

Borg Collective:
The Borg Queen (Borg)

Maps:

The maps would all be flat (non-globe), made out of space tiles and planets. Planets would be 1x1 or 3x3 in size and would cover about 38% of the map (they are closer together then they really should be).

Cities and Such:

Cities would be built on planets ONLY (I would make a resource called “colonizable” and a script that would allow cities to be built only on it), they would be capable of “mining:” the space around them (as the max planet size is 3x3, there will always be some space within the city radius) similar to how cities work sea tiles.

All resources (other then the ones on planets) would be mined with a single improvement; a Space Station, and such a station would also add 1 latinum and act as a fortress. For planet resources I will probably keep it similar to how it is for land resources in civ4.

Units:

There will be only ONE type of unit: the star ship. This one unit type will be capable of flying “over” planet tiles and moving across all space tiles. Units within this type would be Colony Ships, Construction Ships and military ship classes.


Religion:

…does not really exist in any large way in Star Trek. Any ideas for what to use in place of religion are very welcome, I don’t want to trash the whole system.

Civics:

Will be very similar to Civ4, just with more Star Trek (extreme) Civics. The religion civics will be replaced with military stance civics.

Buildings:

Will be similar to civ4. The airport will be a Trans-Warp Gateway, Harbor a Space-Port, etc.

Great People:

The only change will be the addition of a Great Officer (Admiral, Capitan, etc), Great Merchant (why was there none in Civ4?), and (possibly) Great Diplomat.

Wonders:

Here is a list of wonders I know are needed, I will add more:

Star-Fleet Command: Adds a Training Facility to every city, Increases Great Officer birth rate.
Zefram Cochrane Memorial: Increases Great Engineer birth rate, 2+ science, gets one Great Engineer when built.
Trans-Warp Hub: Adds a Trans-Warp Gateway to every city, Increases Great Engineer birth rate, 2+ production.
Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards: City produces all units 50% faster, Increases Great Engineer birth rate.
Supreme Assembly: All government Civics? Free up-keep? I don’t know.
Tower of commerce: +4 latinum, all cities generate +2 latinum, free economy civic up-keep, Increases Great Merchant birth rate.

This will be updated.

 

[Ranbir]

I think maybe you should look into having each "city" a solar system, rather than a planet. Similar to Birth of the Federation. Treating it like a solar system, may create a better feel of the expanse of space, that it's huge.

Ooh, also maybe a wormhole can be modded in? Maybe Nebulai and blackholes. It'll beat Space being just black. I'm a big Trekki so I wish you well.

 

[sovarn]

don't have any ideas right now but I would be willing to help

 

[bky1701]

As for the city, I thought about that, but it didn’t seem like it would work without large changes to the game (to make it more like BOTF), as there would only be one possible resource per solar system and the city would work the space around it. The 1x1 planets could be used to make something like a solar system.

It would be possible to add the BOTF system for cities, but it may take away from the Civ4 feel… as working tiles around the solar system wouldn’t really fit, so the whole way cities work would need changed.

Something I didn’t note in my main post: I am going to massively change diplomacy and espionage, espionage will be more like what was in BOTF, but expanded much.

I was also thinking about wormholes and black-holes, but I have not come to a conclusion on the best way to implement them.

 

[Door]

There are some religions in Star Trek, though not really as present. Bajoran, Klingon and Dominion (at least Jem'Hadar and Vorta) religions come to mind but there are probably more. A better idea would be to use philosophies, or mix them with religions. There are quite a lot: The Borg believe in improving the life of all species by assimilating them into a collective intelligence. The Vulcans have IDIC and logic. The Klingons believe primarily in honour, dying in battle etc. The Federation has the Prime Directive and a general philosophy of peace and cooperation. The Dominion exists because the Founders believed that the only way to avoid persecution was to control the other races. The Ferengi philosophy is fairly obvious . The Cardassians and Romulans are both fairly fascist, but that has more to do with civics than religion.

I hope that helps in some way. This sounds like a great idea for a mod .

 

[Mujadaddy]

I actually did A LOT of work on a similar "Space" mod for Civ2, years ago... Here's what I suggest (humbly )

Space: No problem---make "Deep Space" ocean. Then you can have system craft (work boats/galleys) in the local systems... Put whatever features you like there, art-wise... but DON'T let it have food generation!

Systems: here's where it gets FUN (in my opinion ) ---- You can only put cities on LAND... so, you have Land squares that are varying sizes...but here's the deal---1 square & 2x2 squares are fine, but when you get bigger than that, you HAVE to leave gaps in the "planetary mass" so that starships can launch/land, no matter where the player puts their city! (for example, if you go 3x3, you ought to leave the center square vacant, so that wherever a player puts his city is adjacent to "space."

Systems, Part 2 ---- Moons, asteroid belts and other systemic bodies aren't great places for colonies----but you might be forced to expand your cultural boundary to get that juicy Deuterium deposit way out-system... These should be, by design, resource-rich... Also, these squares are "Coastal" or Local Space (for ships) so that shuttlecraft/prewarp craft can move things around...

The Big Picture ---- Now that we have Deep Space and Local Space and Planets, Moons & Asteroids (of varying sizes & compositions), the Systems themselves don't have to be LITERALLY huge #'s of squares apart as long as there is OCEAN (which can only be crossed by Starships) between them. (Eventually, you will encounter Aircraft, which can fly OVER the ocean--- keep this in mind conceptually)

But that's the basic picture you should consider---Civ already has all the fundamentals in place for a ripping good space adventure!



Oh, a PS---now in Civ4, we have Mountain Peaks that are impassable to ground (and sea) units --- consider re-drawing these for Nebulae/BlackHoles & other impassable interstellar phenomena?

 

[Ranbir]

Another game in mind, how about like Imperium Galactic. Since the map can be living, have the planets orbit a sun...

I guess considering the powers of mod, can't even the way the engine is used be changed?

 

[dc82]

Yeah I think one diff. that Star Trek had to other space themed shows was that the Star Trek spaceships resembled or were modeled more after the navy than the air force - hence, you have naval rankings, ships ranging from transport vessels to "battleship" constitution, intrepid class ships - I like the idea of making most of space "ocean" tile, with a few "land" tiles. All the spaceships, however, may have different transport capabilities, so that "cities" can be conquered by units within each ship - gives it a more realistic and fun spin to things too.

 

[sovarn]

We can make each land tile a specific type of planet and cluster them together to make a system, although this would have to be done manually otherwise it would be hell trying to harvest the tiles.

And now we can harvest sea tiles too so the "space" tiles can be harvested too.
Maybe we can give each space tile 0 for everything then by builing say some matter convertor or something have the space tile create 4 food or 4 hammers.
or something like that.
And i also dont think there a limit to the type of tiles you can have so you potentially have a lot of different planets types.

Religion we should keep in for the strategic values and just a greater gameplay. as long as they are canon it shuold be fine, doesnt matter which civ get which religion b/c the game is not a simimulation of "real life".

Civics there is a relatively wide range, cant think of specifics for now. We should keep the game simple and not mod in extra stuff just change things around. Of course will be a lot of hard work but i would be willing to help. Once the SDK comes out i will try to figure out to make units.

 

[Dismal]

This sounds very interesting and if done right (which it seems it will be) will be awsome. Gameplay wise seems like you have things down pat however I need to stress if this is to suceed the units/buildings etc NEED to look GOOD. Many people won't play if stuff is ugly, sadly.

I can just imagine though the era advances. Inital units would be simlpe basic starships with basic looking cities (similar to our modern cities) and as you go on you get into the intergalactic giant cities with towering buildings etc.
regarding your idea of space station, I think you need space stations as well as work stations/mining facilities or something. the idea of being able to surround a city in forts is kind of poor imo.
And one more thing - remember the air bases in civ3? How about deep space outposts...they would be a place to fix ships (slow repair rate) and would allow you to have bases to patrol space beyond/between your plants.

I'll help you out as much as I can if you want, though my skills are limited to xml editing (but then again anyone can open up a file in notepad and change values) and I could make maps (and scenarios with a bit of work I'm sure.)

Great idea!

 

[admiral-bell]

Thi is good, but you should be able to land infantry

 

[Ranbir]

I like the one square is land, representing planet. coast and sea can represent low and high orbits. Where mining and stuff can be. Like Orbital batteries, or solar batteries, etc.

Then the ocean can be deep space, with nebulai and stuff.

Yeah, nice one guys. This might be really cool.

 

[sovarn]

so who has volunteered to create this mod

on a side note, if you are looking for a 4x strat featuring the ST world, you can find the BOTF2 page here.
http://www.botf2.com.

im sure if we ask nicely we can get ship models from here. they got like 200 ships or something crazy like that.

 

[monkeyman90000]

this sounds very interesting i forund this site that has a hole other bunch of modes with ships and things but its for star trek armada 2 tho i think there skins would be good for the ships there not bad at all thers a few that look bad but if u get them from the acual game there not bad

http://armada2.filefront.com/

 

[Ranbir]

They're making a second botf ? Or is it some fan project...hmm anyway cool cool.

Yeah, use Armada, Botf, maybe some from Starfleet Command.

 

[Flamand]

I'm working at a elaborate Star Trek mod for Civ III, maybe you can pickup some ideas there? You can find the links in my signature...

 

[Promenthus]

Well, obviously I've volunteered . Of course, I am asking Flamand, with all my sincerity, to join the team as lead artist. I mean, we all love his units, right?! RIGHT?

The Prometheus just won me over... I LOVED IT
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=3456057#post3456057

 

[Rushster]

This would be awesome, something I would love to see as a Trek nut, look forward to seeing the fruits of your labour eventually

 

[Felzor]

This is a great idea and an ambitious project. I highly recommend (as others already have) taking a strong look at Civ 2 and Civ 3 Star Trek mods and go from there.

As for the planets debate, I personally think it is foolish to make any habitable tile greater than 1X1. If you start making 2X2 or 3X3 planets, suddenly you have these huge pieces of rock on a very small map that is supposed to represent the entire universe. Keep planets 1X1, period, is my suggestion. Beyond that, I think you have a few options for how to go about making this map:

1) You could scatter planets all over the map, each roughly the same distance from eachother--just a random scatter. Each planet would represent a different "class" of planet. For example, Earth is a class M planet if I recall, suitable for growing and sustaining life. This planet would give, say, 12 food, 10 commerce, and 6 shields. You could also make Class "Insert Letter Here" (Sorry, I'm not the Trekkie I should be!), each with various strengths and weaknesses. A planet of mostly rock but with no atmosphere should provide ample production but limited food--say, 6 food, 6 commerce, 12 production. Even though only class M planets are habitable, I think you should allow "cities" to be built on all classes of planets anyway. Then, in order to ensure that cities grow and receive bonuses when they do, make different tiles of space, each with different resource values. Just like a grassland on a forest receives 1 food and two hammers, mix and match with space tiles as well--but remember, cities can only be built on planets. Also throw in a few resource-rich asteroid belts for good measure. This style most closely represents the current Civ IV game.

2) Another option is to do the same as above, but, as someone else said, turn each planet into a solar system. This helps create a feel as to the largeness of space and might allow addition of all important landmarks in the Star Trek universe. The problem here is dividing up the resources and graphics of the solar system. Planets are easier because you KNOW a Class M planet is going to look a lot like Earth and probably be a small size, while a gaseous planet might be red or green or something (check the Star Trek directory). But can you really say that this solar system is more "resource-rich" than that one on the other side of the galaxy?

3) Or, you could sort of do a combination of the two by making areas of space that are essentially solar systems by incorporating a few different classes of planets. This would make clusters of cities separated by vast regions of "ocean" space. Every solar system would have one tile for a "Star," and then anywhere from 3 to 6 planets surrounding it, but closely surrounding it (a solar system, as a whole, would not extend beyond a region of 6X6 tiles). Then you could distinguish between "land" space, which again could provide different amounts of food/commerce/production, and "ocean" space, which would be the stuff separating solar systems. You could also build "roads" in a solarsystem, calling them "star routes" or something (the assumption would be that they would be established routes between two planets in a system, as if the Earth continuted to use the same route to get to Mars).

Just throwing ideas out there.