Disco_Hammurabi
Chieftain
- Joined
- Oct 31, 2014
- Messages
- 2
I am a huge fan of the franchise and logged well more than 600 hours on Civ5. I do not consider myself a gamer, but SM and Firaxis games can usually get me to commit absurd amounts of time and energy to gaming. That said, I am a fan of this new Civ game, but would love to share, for the first time, my thoughts on improving it.
OUTPOSTS:
Instead of having the outpost phase simply be a turn-waster, why not make it interesting and give it some utility? First, limiting what an outpost can do would make sense. Of course, you could trade with outposts, but perhaps you couldn't build any buildings within one. They might have a military and economic advantage, but would not have grant any new tiles to your borders (though they would have ZOC implications).
I'd venture to say that outposts would be more interesting if they automatically granted you the resource they were built upon, provided you had the technology for it. This would be a unique way to gain an Affinity-specific resource you need even if it's in a remote location or not a good potential city-site. Of course, instead of a colonist unit, perhaps the outpost-unit would be a different, cheaper unit.
Of course, if the outpost unit were cheaper than a colonist, then the colonist unit would have to automatically found a city and it should not then be easy, but any stretch of the imagination, to morph an outpost into a city. So perhaps tying a certain, challenging quest to changing an outpost into a city could mitigate city-spamming through outpost usage. Additionally, a limit on the number of cities founded via outposts could also be feasible.
Moving and outpost might be a unique way to modify play, as well. Sort of like a roving fort (read: Civ5 citadel) that grants unique defense bonuses and an extra trade route (instead of the Autoplant), a route which is maybe a little closer to that station or neighbor you didn't have the range to reach in the early game. Also, when making planetfall, the player's initial city could also start as an outpost that could potentially be packed up and moved after a few turns if it wasn't the desired location. This would be fraught with advantages and disadvantages, but would make some sense given that the other factions land staggered after you do, as well.
There are a million other ways to rethink the entire outpost phase, as well, rather than just having it be a click-and-forget enterprise as it is now.
STATIONS:
Directly related to my thoughts on outposts is the station concept. Right now, they are weak, useless, and frankly aggravating. In the early game, the outposts usually settle right where I'd like to place my second city (ARGH!). Maybe I wouldn't mind this so much if, after some time and the right diplomatic touch, I could annex the station into my civilization and control it AS my second city! How novel!!! But seriously, wouldn't a group of loners living in a rickety outpost/station want the comfort of joining with a major sponsor like ARC or Polystralia if they found themselves stranded on a brand new world?
Perhaps another direction would serve the station concept better though. The city-state concept was not ill-executed in Civ5 and would grant much more dynamic gameplay surrounding stations in Civ:BE. Ideally, I'd like to see both concepts executed with the one-tile stations acting like trading posts that could potentially be annexed or eradicated (by aliens as well) if they're in the way and larger city-states with borders, units, and watered down diplomacy. The city-state-ish stations would be sponsor-less landings that could be belligerent (units), economic, or culture/religious fanatics. Their impact on the environment could sway you and the other civs to wipre them off the new planet, conquer them, or peacefully coexist with them.
QUESTS:
Like many, I believe that the challenges that are actually quests are quite cool. The selection of what a specific building produces is less than a quest and more a question (see what I did there?). Differentiating between the two and amping up the actual quests in number and challenge would be fantastic. Implementing some of the outpost/station ideas above and basing quests around them would greatly serve toward this goal.
Therefore, instead of generating a laundry list of quests in the quest menu, quests would have to be accepted by the player based on their interest in completing said quest. Of course the quests would be tied to certain Affinities or perhaps be a "neutral" quest which would lead to a large payoff in some other way.
I don't have much more to say on quests, but there is certainly a lot of room for improvement here.
UNITS:
Here I'm particularly talking about military units (although I also somewhat miss the Great Person units, I'm not hung up on it and will adjust to their loss if the outpost idea above is included). It's a little sad to see no diversity whatsoever in military units from nation to nation. While I do like the Affinity-specific units, I don't see why this precludes any nation-specific units from being available.
Also, why no submarine unit or underwater layer? I won't go into detail on the underwater layer (which would be awesome) because others have done so with more enthusiasm than I would, but did mankind forget how to traverse underwater when coming to a distant planet. This more affects unit diversity more than anything else as there really isn't much difference between a sub and a ship in Civ games except which can attack a city and which can't. That would be a totally different story with the underwater layer, though, and the introduction of a flight-capable/submersible unit would be interesting, to say the least.
And what about the alien units?? Sure I can research some bones and get a drone or raptor or whatever. Why can't I, as a Harmony player, convert the bugs to my side like a privateer or German Civ5 unit? Maybe they'd be weaker than units I build, but they'd allow me to get cheap units without dedicating production to them. Maybe that's unfair to to Supremacy and Purity players, but this could be offset by their ability to subjugate or coerce the aliens into their control and utilize them in a similar manner. Then Harmony-aligned players may only have the advantage of being able to use a unique unit to create an aggressive alien nest within the borders of their enemies.
Also, a splash of color on the units to differentiate would be nice. I'm not just talking about Faction units, either, but the aliens could be totally random colors every game as well. Since each planet is supposedly a whole different planet depending on game, why not render the aliens at least a little differently each time? I can't imagine it would be that difficult and the visual impact would be dramatic in affecting replayability, at least for me.
ALIENS:
Which brings me to the aliens themselves ... A little diversity wouldn't hurt them at all. I understand why they don't level up with Affinity advancements (like barbs might), but perhaps a swarm of bioluminescent, ocean-dwelling jelly fish might jazz up the sea dragons and krakens. Maybe spotting a xenotitan in the wild would be neat, too. Or perhaps a couple of unrelated alien fauna exist in addition to the green bugs that are running around. Terrain-specific abominable snowmen critters, desert scorpions, and furry mountain creatures would really make a drastic varietal improvement to gameplay. That said, the bugs are actually just fine as they are, but they (and other life) have the potential to be ever so much more in the unique environment of Civ:BE.
ENVIRONMENT:
Speaking of which! How have the advanced earthlings of Civ:BE not conquered the mighty mountains (and chasms) yet?!? While I like that units can't just mosey right on over them like Dido's elephants, I fail to see why advanced robo-workers cannot tunnel through them or bridge them with their magrails and roads. This would be a strategic decision to either send units to the forefront (PAC usually attacks me; Daoming's pretty aggro); or else, don't build them at all to prevent enemy units from using them to zip right up to your capital. The option, at least, would be nice.
What about water? So my military units can levitate over them in late game, which kicks butt. Why can't my amphibious workers bridge bodies of water? Sure, limit it to one tile expanses, but in this day of Golden Gates and Chesapeake Bay bridges, I don't see it being impossible for land units to cross an small stretch of ocean within their own borders without the need for embarkation.
How about utilizing the terraforming power of that orbital layer a little more, too? Perhaps a satellite that raises or flattens mountains over time, for whatever purpose, could be instituted. Or a satellite that dries up
And where are the natural wonders? On a whole new planet riddled with craters and whatnot, there's not a single feature of note? A Lake Victoria of entirely xenomass, unable to be developed by workers sure, but workable by a city for boatload of zenomass resources. How about a meteor-strike crater of a celestial body composed entirely or firaxite? Or a megalithic floatstone mountain? Surely this bizarre alien world has something worth finding on it!!
Aesthetically, a little variation in the unique tiles for coral would also go a long way. Why always that light bluish green sigma shape? A little pink and a different shape would go a long way to spicing up the map, especially when two coral tiles are adjacent to one another.
WONDERS
Snooze. Nothing wonderful here. Same sort of schtick as Civ5, great, but the blueprint is boring and there is no connection to these wonders as there would be to building something that some players may have actually seen in real life somewhere on Earth. So, how to invigorate the wonders? Well, the majority can be left alone, but perhaps a few could be tossed in that are similar to the unique tile improvement wonders of the Emancipation Gate, Exodus Gate, or Mind Flower?
These unique tile improvements would act similar to the academy, manufactory, citadel, etc., from Civ5 (I know these are already buildable), but come with a permanent city bonus as well as being a new workable tile. Perhaps a special military wonder would allow a citadel type tile in the city's vicinity that would allow stacking (Heaven forbid) a limited number of military units. This would be a great place to build your Emancipation Gate near.
How about a Xenosanctuary that looks a alien nest and, in addition to whatever bonuses, spawns a random alien unit for you to control every ten, twenty, or thirty turns? You can commit this unit to your battle or recycle it for a few quick energy credits.
Same as above but with a robot factory (Supremacy) or a cloning facility (Purity).
These are just some ideas, but the tile specific improvement wonders are my main idea to improve the wonders in general. I'd also suggest limiting the number that be created in any city to two or three, so players would have to choose carefully which are most useful for their civilization.
VICTORIES
"Liberating" earthlings or saving them and awakening the planet just seem so "meh" after the first couple times doing them. I'm not saying to eliminate them, but Civ5 didn't have an Order, Freedom, or Autocracy specific victory and that's it. Contact and Domination aren't enough to make me feel like I can be Supremacy affiliated without feeling the need to build an Emancipation Gate (just in case my war effort goes south or another player is closer to a victory than my war will last).
Diplomatic Victory:
I'd like to see some return of a UN-type situation diplomatic victory. Peacefully proclaim yourself planetary Supreme Allied Commander or some such. A return of the World Congress in some form or other would be a welcome addition to Beyond Earth, for sure.
Colonization Victory:
Another idea might be colonization ... yes, colonization - why not? It worked for Civ5 and the other games. Instead of sending your people into space toward one planet, perhaps you are the first civ to become able to populate this entire new galaxy through an orbital wonder which transports a number of colonists off-world to new homes throughout the star system. Perhaps this could be aligned with a Purity-specific science victory (see below).
Step 1: Build teleport gate of some kind.
Step 2: Build multiple rocket launch platform and launch rockets to set up touchdown locations throughout the galaxy.
Step 3: Build X number of colonist units.
Victory: Send colonists through gate onto multiple worlds.
Science Victory:
The science victory could easily be tailored to suit the Affinities, as well. Supremacy science victory would be to research a super advanced tech and build a machine which embodies the collective consciousness of your civilization and perpetuates infinitely by blasting it into space all over the universe or whatever. One for Harmony would be similar to awakening the planet, but doing so by integrating your civ's consciousness into the planet and creating a network of sentient planets throughout the universe to achieve the same result as the Supremacy thing above. Not sure how to do it for Purity (maybe a galactic terraforming device?) but the idea in all of these is the same: an apotheosis of your civ achieving some form of immortality through technology aligned with its Affinity.
Culture Victory:
Maybe you can convince all the other civs to adopt your Affinity over their own through cultural influence? I have thought about this one the least, obviously, but it doesn't mean it's not a viable option if implemented correctly.
FACTIONS
Easy enough - more of them and more interesting. For those who recall SMAC, each faction was kind of already aligned with an "affinity," and this made them very interesting indeed. In fact, Rejinaldo looks like a throwback homage to Colonel Santiago of the Spartans, but the Civ:BE factions are pale shades of the interesting back stories of SMAC. I know I'll offend someone at the Firaxis team here, but the "Uncle Neverclone" tripe that pervades the wonder and tech screens is just plain dull. I miss Lady Deirdre rambling about a sentient planet. As an aside, an obvious mod that will be built will be a SMAC-clone on the BE engine, for sure.
Now that I've fussed about it, how do we fix the current factions? Well, for one, there could be an intro screen during the map-loading explaining your leader, their faction, and their history since the Great Mistake. It was cool in Civ5 being hailed as Ramses II, Boudicca, or Dido and being told your own biography. It's better than the tiny glimpse into the psyche of the Civ:BE leaders we get from their "personal log."
Colors on units would also help (did I say that already? - it's worth saying again), rather than just colored sphere of influence tiles and icons over the same units controlled by different factions.
The best way I could see is re-introducing "religion" for lack of a better word. The new factions could choose to adopt, as a way of life, one of the mindsets from Alpha Centauri. Removing the Supremacy (Zhakarov), Harmony (Deirdre), and Purity (Miriam? Yang?), this would mean a "religious" affiliation with an ideal (and here I borrow heavily from the SMAC Wikipedia entry): environmentalism, capitalism, militarism, anti-authoritarianism, piracy, classic liberalism.
One thought on factions that's TOTALLY out there, and would take the whole Contact Victory out of the game, would be sentient, humanoid alien factions - complete with their own reasons for coming to this planet at the same time as us Earthlings or perhaps indigenous and apprehensive, appreciative, or upset that we've come to join them. I don't really like this idea, but it's there and I thought it worth mentioning since a game dev might be able to more with it than I could. I never played Alien Crossfire with SMAC, but the concept seems neat. The whole Chiron/Tau Ceti thing with Alpha Centauri was a lot more specific though.
Anyway, I really hope some devs read this and take me seriously (especially re: the outpost, station, and quest suggestions). Thanks for reading and hopefully some of this makes it into a patch or expansion.
OUTPOSTS:
Instead of having the outpost phase simply be a turn-waster, why not make it interesting and give it some utility? First, limiting what an outpost can do would make sense. Of course, you could trade with outposts, but perhaps you couldn't build any buildings within one. They might have a military and economic advantage, but would not have grant any new tiles to your borders (though they would have ZOC implications).
I'd venture to say that outposts would be more interesting if they automatically granted you the resource they were built upon, provided you had the technology for it. This would be a unique way to gain an Affinity-specific resource you need even if it's in a remote location or not a good potential city-site. Of course, instead of a colonist unit, perhaps the outpost-unit would be a different, cheaper unit.
Of course, if the outpost unit were cheaper than a colonist, then the colonist unit would have to automatically found a city and it should not then be easy, but any stretch of the imagination, to morph an outpost into a city. So perhaps tying a certain, challenging quest to changing an outpost into a city could mitigate city-spamming through outpost usage. Additionally, a limit on the number of cities founded via outposts could also be feasible.
Moving and outpost might be a unique way to modify play, as well. Sort of like a roving fort (read: Civ5 citadel) that grants unique defense bonuses and an extra trade route (instead of the Autoplant), a route which is maybe a little closer to that station or neighbor you didn't have the range to reach in the early game. Also, when making planetfall, the player's initial city could also start as an outpost that could potentially be packed up and moved after a few turns if it wasn't the desired location. This would be fraught with advantages and disadvantages, but would make some sense given that the other factions land staggered after you do, as well.
There are a million other ways to rethink the entire outpost phase, as well, rather than just having it be a click-and-forget enterprise as it is now.
STATIONS:
Directly related to my thoughts on outposts is the station concept. Right now, they are weak, useless, and frankly aggravating. In the early game, the outposts usually settle right where I'd like to place my second city (ARGH!). Maybe I wouldn't mind this so much if, after some time and the right diplomatic touch, I could annex the station into my civilization and control it AS my second city! How novel!!! But seriously, wouldn't a group of loners living in a rickety outpost/station want the comfort of joining with a major sponsor like ARC or Polystralia if they found themselves stranded on a brand new world?
Perhaps another direction would serve the station concept better though. The city-state concept was not ill-executed in Civ5 and would grant much more dynamic gameplay surrounding stations in Civ:BE. Ideally, I'd like to see both concepts executed with the one-tile stations acting like trading posts that could potentially be annexed or eradicated (by aliens as well) if they're in the way and larger city-states with borders, units, and watered down diplomacy. The city-state-ish stations would be sponsor-less landings that could be belligerent (units), economic, or culture/religious fanatics. Their impact on the environment could sway you and the other civs to wipre them off the new planet, conquer them, or peacefully coexist with them.
QUESTS:
Like many, I believe that the challenges that are actually quests are quite cool. The selection of what a specific building produces is less than a quest and more a question (see what I did there?). Differentiating between the two and amping up the actual quests in number and challenge would be fantastic. Implementing some of the outpost/station ideas above and basing quests around them would greatly serve toward this goal.
Therefore, instead of generating a laundry list of quests in the quest menu, quests would have to be accepted by the player based on their interest in completing said quest. Of course the quests would be tied to certain Affinities or perhaps be a "neutral" quest which would lead to a large payoff in some other way.
I don't have much more to say on quests, but there is certainly a lot of room for improvement here.
UNITS:
Here I'm particularly talking about military units (although I also somewhat miss the Great Person units, I'm not hung up on it and will adjust to their loss if the outpost idea above is included). It's a little sad to see no diversity whatsoever in military units from nation to nation. While I do like the Affinity-specific units, I don't see why this precludes any nation-specific units from being available.
Also, why no submarine unit or underwater layer? I won't go into detail on the underwater layer (which would be awesome) because others have done so with more enthusiasm than I would, but did mankind forget how to traverse underwater when coming to a distant planet. This more affects unit diversity more than anything else as there really isn't much difference between a sub and a ship in Civ games except which can attack a city and which can't. That would be a totally different story with the underwater layer, though, and the introduction of a flight-capable/submersible unit would be interesting, to say the least.
And what about the alien units?? Sure I can research some bones and get a drone or raptor or whatever. Why can't I, as a Harmony player, convert the bugs to my side like a privateer or German Civ5 unit? Maybe they'd be weaker than units I build, but they'd allow me to get cheap units without dedicating production to them. Maybe that's unfair to to Supremacy and Purity players, but this could be offset by their ability to subjugate or coerce the aliens into their control and utilize them in a similar manner. Then Harmony-aligned players may only have the advantage of being able to use a unique unit to create an aggressive alien nest within the borders of their enemies.
Also, a splash of color on the units to differentiate would be nice. I'm not just talking about Faction units, either, but the aliens could be totally random colors every game as well. Since each planet is supposedly a whole different planet depending on game, why not render the aliens at least a little differently each time? I can't imagine it would be that difficult and the visual impact would be dramatic in affecting replayability, at least for me.
ALIENS:
Which brings me to the aliens themselves ... A little diversity wouldn't hurt them at all. I understand why they don't level up with Affinity advancements (like barbs might), but perhaps a swarm of bioluminescent, ocean-dwelling jelly fish might jazz up the sea dragons and krakens. Maybe spotting a xenotitan in the wild would be neat, too. Or perhaps a couple of unrelated alien fauna exist in addition to the green bugs that are running around. Terrain-specific abominable snowmen critters, desert scorpions, and furry mountain creatures would really make a drastic varietal improvement to gameplay. That said, the bugs are actually just fine as they are, but they (and other life) have the potential to be ever so much more in the unique environment of Civ:BE.
ENVIRONMENT:
Speaking of which! How have the advanced earthlings of Civ:BE not conquered the mighty mountains (and chasms) yet?!? While I like that units can't just mosey right on over them like Dido's elephants, I fail to see why advanced robo-workers cannot tunnel through them or bridge them with their magrails and roads. This would be a strategic decision to either send units to the forefront (PAC usually attacks me; Daoming's pretty aggro); or else, don't build them at all to prevent enemy units from using them to zip right up to your capital. The option, at least, would be nice.
What about water? So my military units can levitate over them in late game, which kicks butt. Why can't my amphibious workers bridge bodies of water? Sure, limit it to one tile expanses, but in this day of Golden Gates and Chesapeake Bay bridges, I don't see it being impossible for land units to cross an small stretch of ocean within their own borders without the need for embarkation.
How about utilizing the terraforming power of that orbital layer a little more, too? Perhaps a satellite that raises or flattens mountains over time, for whatever purpose, could be instituted. Or a satellite that dries up
And where are the natural wonders? On a whole new planet riddled with craters and whatnot, there's not a single feature of note? A Lake Victoria of entirely xenomass, unable to be developed by workers sure, but workable by a city for boatload of zenomass resources. How about a meteor-strike crater of a celestial body composed entirely or firaxite? Or a megalithic floatstone mountain? Surely this bizarre alien world has something worth finding on it!!
Aesthetically, a little variation in the unique tiles for coral would also go a long way. Why always that light bluish green sigma shape? A little pink and a different shape would go a long way to spicing up the map, especially when two coral tiles are adjacent to one another.
WONDERS
Snooze. Nothing wonderful here. Same sort of schtick as Civ5, great, but the blueprint is boring and there is no connection to these wonders as there would be to building something that some players may have actually seen in real life somewhere on Earth. So, how to invigorate the wonders? Well, the majority can be left alone, but perhaps a few could be tossed in that are similar to the unique tile improvement wonders of the Emancipation Gate, Exodus Gate, or Mind Flower?
These unique tile improvements would act similar to the academy, manufactory, citadel, etc., from Civ5 (I know these are already buildable), but come with a permanent city bonus as well as being a new workable tile. Perhaps a special military wonder would allow a citadel type tile in the city's vicinity that would allow stacking (Heaven forbid) a limited number of military units. This would be a great place to build your Emancipation Gate near.
How about a Xenosanctuary that looks a alien nest and, in addition to whatever bonuses, spawns a random alien unit for you to control every ten, twenty, or thirty turns? You can commit this unit to your battle or recycle it for a few quick energy credits.
Same as above but with a robot factory (Supremacy) or a cloning facility (Purity).
These are just some ideas, but the tile specific improvement wonders are my main idea to improve the wonders in general. I'd also suggest limiting the number that be created in any city to two or three, so players would have to choose carefully which are most useful for their civilization.
VICTORIES
"Liberating" earthlings or saving them and awakening the planet just seem so "meh" after the first couple times doing them. I'm not saying to eliminate them, but Civ5 didn't have an Order, Freedom, or Autocracy specific victory and that's it. Contact and Domination aren't enough to make me feel like I can be Supremacy affiliated without feeling the need to build an Emancipation Gate (just in case my war effort goes south or another player is closer to a victory than my war will last).
Diplomatic Victory:
I'd like to see some return of a UN-type situation diplomatic victory. Peacefully proclaim yourself planetary Supreme Allied Commander or some such. A return of the World Congress in some form or other would be a welcome addition to Beyond Earth, for sure.
Colonization Victory:
Another idea might be colonization ... yes, colonization - why not? It worked for Civ5 and the other games. Instead of sending your people into space toward one planet, perhaps you are the first civ to become able to populate this entire new galaxy through an orbital wonder which transports a number of colonists off-world to new homes throughout the star system. Perhaps this could be aligned with a Purity-specific science victory (see below).
Step 1: Build teleport gate of some kind.
Step 2: Build multiple rocket launch platform and launch rockets to set up touchdown locations throughout the galaxy.
Step 3: Build X number of colonist units.
Victory: Send colonists through gate onto multiple worlds.
Science Victory:
The science victory could easily be tailored to suit the Affinities, as well. Supremacy science victory would be to research a super advanced tech and build a machine which embodies the collective consciousness of your civilization and perpetuates infinitely by blasting it into space all over the universe or whatever. One for Harmony would be similar to awakening the planet, but doing so by integrating your civ's consciousness into the planet and creating a network of sentient planets throughout the universe to achieve the same result as the Supremacy thing above. Not sure how to do it for Purity (maybe a galactic terraforming device?) but the idea in all of these is the same: an apotheosis of your civ achieving some form of immortality through technology aligned with its Affinity.
Culture Victory:
Maybe you can convince all the other civs to adopt your Affinity over their own through cultural influence? I have thought about this one the least, obviously, but it doesn't mean it's not a viable option if implemented correctly.
FACTIONS
Easy enough - more of them and more interesting. For those who recall SMAC, each faction was kind of already aligned with an "affinity," and this made them very interesting indeed. In fact, Rejinaldo looks like a throwback homage to Colonel Santiago of the Spartans, but the Civ:BE factions are pale shades of the interesting back stories of SMAC. I know I'll offend someone at the Firaxis team here, but the "Uncle Neverclone" tripe that pervades the wonder and tech screens is just plain dull. I miss Lady Deirdre rambling about a sentient planet. As an aside, an obvious mod that will be built will be a SMAC-clone on the BE engine, for sure.
Now that I've fussed about it, how do we fix the current factions? Well, for one, there could be an intro screen during the map-loading explaining your leader, their faction, and their history since the Great Mistake. It was cool in Civ5 being hailed as Ramses II, Boudicca, or Dido and being told your own biography. It's better than the tiny glimpse into the psyche of the Civ:BE leaders we get from their "personal log."
Colors on units would also help (did I say that already? - it's worth saying again), rather than just colored sphere of influence tiles and icons over the same units controlled by different factions.
The best way I could see is re-introducing "religion" for lack of a better word. The new factions could choose to adopt, as a way of life, one of the mindsets from Alpha Centauri. Removing the Supremacy (Zhakarov), Harmony (Deirdre), and Purity (Miriam? Yang?), this would mean a "religious" affiliation with an ideal (and here I borrow heavily from the SMAC Wikipedia entry): environmentalism, capitalism, militarism, anti-authoritarianism, piracy, classic liberalism.
One thought on factions that's TOTALLY out there, and would take the whole Contact Victory out of the game, would be sentient, humanoid alien factions - complete with their own reasons for coming to this planet at the same time as us Earthlings or perhaps indigenous and apprehensive, appreciative, or upset that we've come to join them. I don't really like this idea, but it's there and I thought it worth mentioning since a game dev might be able to more with it than I could. I never played Alien Crossfire with SMAC, but the concept seems neat. The whole Chiron/Tau Ceti thing with Alpha Centauri was a lot more specific though.
Anyway, I really hope some devs read this and take me seriously (especially re: the outpost, station, and quest suggestions). Thanks for reading and hopefully some of this makes it into a patch or expansion.
