I hate it when I know I need to sleep, but can't. 
Anyway, regarding the Saks, the only thing we can do is encourage them to declare; we can't declare ourselves (not possible in the game!) We had been and should be doing this by scanning their planets, but we've never made a priority target of them for a serious invasion as it was more useful to focus our attention elsewhere. The only reason the Sakkra have not declared by now is because they happen to be at war with the same people we have made priority targets of, and so are happy when we do well. For that, they are willing to overlook our relatively minor incursions with scanner fleets that do no actual harm. Just having scanners over their worlds would not be sufficient to annoy them at this point; we would have to start launching full scale invasions and/or glass one or maybe even a couple of their worlds to make them angry enough to declare.
In Always War in Civ, while you are at war with everyone you meet, there is nothing that says you must go on the offensive against all enemy AIs simultaneously; in fact, it's usually logistically impossible to do so. You're free to use what forces you have to the best of your ability to defend your borders and make gains as you can, where you can. In general, I think the same should apply here. Moreover, IIRC 'enemy of my enemy' diplomacy works in Civ as well, to some extent; at least, if two of your opponents go to war and the flow of their units in your direction drops to a trickle, you're free to take advantage of that in whatever way you see fit to.
Here, the 'must attack all AIs' proviso is an artifact of the fact that the AIs are reluctant to declare war without some form of provocation, and we can't declare war ourselves. When there are no other positive modifiers to relations involved, scanner harrassment will (usually) eventually trigger a war declaration. In the interest of scenario balance, however, I tend to think we want to retain the ability to take advantage of enemy-of-my-enemy diplomacy to forestall too-early final war. IMHO, early final war should always be one of the big threats in an Always War MOO game, but never a certainty from the moment you start the game.
Forcing the use of harassment scanners to trigger AI war declarations is already sufficiently artificial. Dictating more than that, in my view, crosses a line from a rule that is a bit annoying but necessary to get the right feel, to being overly prescriptive. Does anyone feel like this game has not been Always War, even if the Sakkra have not declared war on us in particular? I think if we were to look back at the history of the game, there hasn't been a single year where we haven't been at war with someone, and often more than one other race, since a couple years after we made contact with the Klackons.
Always War MOO will never be exactly like Always War Civ, but it can strive to capture the same feeling of constantly being under the gun. Even though the nature of the gun is a bit different in MOO than in Civ, I hope we have achieved that here, at least in some measure.
Having said that, if we have established that the variant as presented has the correct Always War feel to it, I prefer not to sweat the small stuff -- there is no point in adopting a rules lawyer mentality. For instance, since the point of the scanners is to get the AIs to declare war, once that state has been achieved for a particular race, keeping scanners in that race's territory is a formality that might get us useful info from time to time but needn't be slavishly observed. Again, the spies and so forth are there to encourage war and wartime behaviour; if the Klackons dropped out of contact and we stopped spying on them, it's no big loss; we had nothing further to gain from spying on them anyway. The 'must vote for self' rule is similarly meant to provoke war with the election opponent; if we're already at war with them, then it's not a big deal if we forget to apply the rule once or twice.
The spirit of the rules is that we must strive to prove ourselves through trial-by-fire. It means that the Sakkra are on The List. They just happen to be at the end of it. It doesn't mean that we must convince them of the error of their ways on any schedule but our own. Perhaps the Sakkra have convinced themselves that they will be spared, that our constant scanner incursions are not a harbinger of times to come, as they were for our other foes. Perhaps they have sought to appease us by making common cause against our current foes. But we know better. Their time will come before the end, just as it has for everyone else who stood between us and destiny.
Anyway, regarding the Saks, the only thing we can do is encourage them to declare; we can't declare ourselves (not possible in the game!) We had been and should be doing this by scanning their planets, but we've never made a priority target of them for a serious invasion as it was more useful to focus our attention elsewhere. The only reason the Sakkra have not declared by now is because they happen to be at war with the same people we have made priority targets of, and so are happy when we do well. For that, they are willing to overlook our relatively minor incursions with scanner fleets that do no actual harm. Just having scanners over their worlds would not be sufficient to annoy them at this point; we would have to start launching full scale invasions and/or glass one or maybe even a couple of their worlds to make them angry enough to declare.
In Always War in Civ, while you are at war with everyone you meet, there is nothing that says you must go on the offensive against all enemy AIs simultaneously; in fact, it's usually logistically impossible to do so. You're free to use what forces you have to the best of your ability to defend your borders and make gains as you can, where you can. In general, I think the same should apply here. Moreover, IIRC 'enemy of my enemy' diplomacy works in Civ as well, to some extent; at least, if two of your opponents go to war and the flow of their units in your direction drops to a trickle, you're free to take advantage of that in whatever way you see fit to.
Here, the 'must attack all AIs' proviso is an artifact of the fact that the AIs are reluctant to declare war without some form of provocation, and we can't declare war ourselves. When there are no other positive modifiers to relations involved, scanner harrassment will (usually) eventually trigger a war declaration. In the interest of scenario balance, however, I tend to think we want to retain the ability to take advantage of enemy-of-my-enemy diplomacy to forestall too-early final war. IMHO, early final war should always be one of the big threats in an Always War MOO game, but never a certainty from the moment you start the game.
Forcing the use of harassment scanners to trigger AI war declarations is already sufficiently artificial. Dictating more than that, in my view, crosses a line from a rule that is a bit annoying but necessary to get the right feel, to being overly prescriptive. Does anyone feel like this game has not been Always War, even if the Sakkra have not declared war on us in particular? I think if we were to look back at the history of the game, there hasn't been a single year where we haven't been at war with someone, and often more than one other race, since a couple years after we made contact with the Klackons.
Always War MOO will never be exactly like Always War Civ, but it can strive to capture the same feeling of constantly being under the gun. Even though the nature of the gun is a bit different in MOO than in Civ, I hope we have achieved that here, at least in some measure.
Having said that, if we have established that the variant as presented has the correct Always War feel to it, I prefer not to sweat the small stuff -- there is no point in adopting a rules lawyer mentality. For instance, since the point of the scanners is to get the AIs to declare war, once that state has been achieved for a particular race, keeping scanners in that race's territory is a formality that might get us useful info from time to time but needn't be slavishly observed. Again, the spies and so forth are there to encourage war and wartime behaviour; if the Klackons dropped out of contact and we stopped spying on them, it's no big loss; we had nothing further to gain from spying on them anyway. The 'must vote for self' rule is similarly meant to provoke war with the election opponent; if we're already at war with them, then it's not a big deal if we forget to apply the rule once or twice.
The spirit of the rules is that we must strive to prove ourselves through trial-by-fire. It means that the Sakkra are on The List. They just happen to be at the end of it. It doesn't mean that we must convince them of the error of their ways on any schedule but our own. Perhaps the Sakkra have convinced themselves that they will be spared, that our constant scanner incursions are not a harbinger of times to come, as they were for our other foes. Perhaps they have sought to appease us by making common cause against our current foes. But we know better. Their time will come before the end, just as it has for everyone else who stood between us and destiny.
So do the bugs. They get the same answer.
