Space Wars development thread

[Crossbowman]

sorry havent been here for a while.
What are we discussing now?

We were discussing about united planets, but I think this has ended. So we need a new subject. For this one maybe it will be this:

i hate the idea of mechs, thay are totaly impratical!

a small take on treds or with some kinda hover ability that can hide in budldings or behind a grouping of small trees is whats beast.

what praticality whold a larg, lumbering, very expensive, very complicated to make, and long construtsion time have?? *not to mention an easy target, expecaly at its limbs. on good rpg round to a leg joint chold easly bring it down, and rinder something so overwelmingly expensive useless*

its like haveing a unit with the highs strengh, of like 1000. but giveing every other unit a plus 1000% aginst it. and infantry a pluss 1500% aginist it

That's true. But tanks are very vulnerable too. They can't turn easily so everything is in the design and in the purpose of the unit. But (almost) everyone like mechs so it would be bad to remove them. At least, I will try to make designs so the mechs are not too vulnerable. And with guided mssiles, everything will be easy targets in the future.

(edit) any idea about advisors?

 

[Red Door]

I dont like tanks exactly. Id rather have infantry backed by space fighters/cruisers. Some land vehicles are needed but not a lot.
Advisors are not in game any more, instead the screens are in. I think they are fine but what about religions?

 

[monkeyman90000]

well as do 2 the part of the mechs since i beilive this game is gana be primarly space based (not sure so dont bite my head off about it) that there should be some but not 2 many like make mechs really strong but make them only avaliabale like the spy units a limited amount

 

[Crossbowman]

Bah, I will put everything

Also I am learning how to modand I have 2 quick questions:

1-Where do I find unit categories? (as meelee, ranged, armored, gunpowder...)

2-What are flavours? Here is an example from tech

<Flavors>
<Flavor>
<FlavorType>FLAVOR_RELIGION</FlavorType>
<iFlavor>9</iFlavor>
</Flavor>
<Flavor>
<FlavorType>FLAVOR_GOLD</FlavorType>
<iFlavor>1</iFlavor>
</Flavor>
<Flavor>
<FlavorType>FLAVOR_CULTURE</FlavorType>
<iFlavor>8</iFlavor>
</Flavor>
<Flavor>
<FlavorType>FLAVOR_GROWTH</FlavorType>
<iFlavor>2</iFlavor>
</Flavor>

 

[Arkazius]

A Space Wars scenario sounds fantastic - I worked on one for CivII a while back, but I was doing it by myself, and gave up after I couldn't get all the things in it I wanted. CIV might be the engine to do it.

If there is no change, the water will be replaced by space. I might do some mission maps, but in a normal map, there should be a lot of 8 tiles small planets that looks like this (o are terran, x are space):

x x x x x
x o x o x
x o o o x
x o o o x
x x x x x

This would allow every tile to have access to space (to build ships) and ground units would be essential to capture a planet, but the main battles would be in space, to protect and attack transports and ressources.
There might be some smaller (1 tile) and bigger plantets.
Random maps will be avalaible too, for land battles.

I suggest 2x2 planets. This gives all the tiles access to space, ground "wars" can be fought on the planet, and it is at least somewhat difficult to prevent planetfall by a hostile force.
Single square planets might be appropriate for moons or large asteroids, these woukld also be easily defendable from space attack (city defense bonuses).
3x3 with a hole to allow all squares space access provides greater planetary "surface", but this could be offset on a 2x2 with greater resource values per square.
Another advantage of a 2x2 is in imaging the planet. Each tile of the planet could imaged as a quarter arc, so the whole thing actually looks round and not like some huge space beast has taken a bite out of it.

Huxley Hobbles mentioned new tiles for solar systems for early space travel; just use the existing coastal tiles. All sub-light-speed spacecraft are limited to "coastal" tiles between the planets of a solar system.

 

[ahsingjai]

I would put the ages like this:

Ages:
1-Computer age (Current one we live in)
2-Laser age (We have it now so might as well put this next)
3-Nano age (We end up shrinking things with nano chips)
4-Cold-fission age
5-Space age
6-Antimatter age

 

[Global Nexus]

Honestly, if it were me, I'd make it so that one "builds" on the stars and "works" and "improves" the planets and such around the star. Makes for a really huge, galactic scope, in my opinion. But it's just a thought.

Anyway, I'm pretty decent when it comes to making alien races and their histories. I dunno if that'd help any, but...well...it's there. ^^;

 

[Huxley Hobbes]

Honestly, if it were me, I'd make it so that one "builds" on the stars and "works" and "improves" the planets and such around the star. Makes for a really huge, galactic scope, in my opinion. But it's just a thought.

Anyway, I'm pretty decent when it comes to making alien races and their histories. I dunno if that'd help any, but...well...it's there. ^^;

I think it fairly reasonable to think that in time we will have a pretty large array of space-based facilities. Even today many corporate and government bodies recognize how powerful a zero-g research plant or factory could be, so once the tech comes around various orbital things will be a near-certainty.

As to mechs - they have a handful of very advantages over modern units. First, they have the room for many more weapons. Second, they are extremely manueverable. Third, they will have a massive psychological effect. The point that they are expensive and complicated, as well as potentially vulnerable, is well made. This is why I think Civ 4 should have kept both attack and defense values - Mechs would be great on the attack, less so on the defense. Oh well, bonuses can work as well.

 

[Crossbowman]

Here are my comments for today's posts

size of planets: I don't really know. I would like separate maps for each planet, but it would be hard (if possible). 2x2 planets would be better for the view, but they would be worst for ground battles. So maybe there will be both sizes...

ages: (ths is just what I think about the future) I think the nanotech will come before combat lasers because lasers need a lot of energy. And in the mod, this energy is found near 2150. There could be lasers before but they would not be efficient. By "cold-fission, I think you mean "cold-fusion". That could be discovered in this time, but I don't think this is enough to et an age name. And since the mod is mainly in space, there must be space before the game ends. By space age I mean this is the first age where there can be real space battles, not not the age where the greatest battles happens. If you are not convinced by this, please say why...

Lot of space improvements: that's true so I need to find a lot ofimprovements ideas (any help is welcome)

Global nexus if you want to make alien races I would really like that because I have almost no idea yet. So you can help!

And thanks Huxley Hobbes to have put this thread in your signature

 

[monkeyman90000]

i don't have any more ideas well at least not for now

 

[Bluemofia]

Hmm, reminds me of Smoking Mirror's Space Armada development (that was dropped and forgotten after the 1st beta test).

 

[Global Nexus]

I have a number of alien races I've thought up previously that could be of use -- do you want me to post about them now, or send them in a PM or something?

Also, if you don't plan on including religion, I have an idea for the replacements for the "religion" civics -- race philosophies. For instance, "Racial Supremism" could be a race philosophy. This of course refers to the dominant/founding race of whatever civilization we're talking about. How it would really work, I'm not entirely sure but...it's a thought I had. ^^;

 

[Crossbowman]

Well, post them
There is no reason to hide it

And for race philisophies, this might be a good suggestion, but can you explain it more please?
At least this could be something less precise (like general idealogies)

But for civics types they will not be similar to normal civ 4 (maybe adding an election type)

(edit): see the info file on the first page, it has been updated

 

[Global Nexus]

Well, a racial philosophy could be "Universal Equality", for instance, in which the dominant race of a civilization would as a general rule seek to equalize all races into their civilization. They don't view themselves as superior, simply different. A "Racial Supremacist" civilization would have the dominant race look down upon and persecute any other race in the civilization -- which would probably create huge rifts with other civilizations. Unfortunately, now that I think about it it might be a tad bit limited in its scope...

 

[Lord_ZealoN]

OMG

I wanna a space mod for my civ. Yes please.

Adding this post to Bookmarks.

 

[Anima Croatorum]

Suggestion about planets:

Very Small(2):
xxxx
x00x
xxxx

Small(4):

xxxx
x00x
x00x
xxxx

Normal(8, rotate anyway you wish):
xxxxx
xx00x
x000x
x000x
xxxxx

Large(12, rotate any way you wish):
xxxxxx
xxx0xx
xx000x
x0000x
x000xx
xx0xxx
xxxxxx

Huge(16, rotate any way you wish):
xxxxxxx
xxx00xx
x00000x
x00000x
xx00xxx
xx00xxx
xxxxxxx

 

[Crossbowman]

I have started XML modding The first era techs are now created (but not their cost). I have many questions, but there s one that I really want to ask: is there a free program that can edit .dds files?

Also, Anima forgot an important planet size:

xxooxx
xoooox
xoooox
xxooxx

This is the largest circular planet where every tile is next to a space tile

 

[Beelze]

Hmm just a thought (reason i signed up ) but couldnt you allow naval units to cross land tiles? ill assume you will use naval units for space units seeing your replacing water. Dunno if this is possible but shouldnt it be as simple as changing some settings for units?

This way the AI will be able to build ships wherever and you could have normal, spherical looking 'planets'.

 

[hanskamp]

An interesting thread, since I started a thread about science fiction mod...

I have a few ideas about races and religions.

For races there are 2 possibilities.
- 4 groups: Humans, Alien races and Robotic "races" and Animals (several robots. Each robot "race" is unique in behaviour, artificial intelligence);
- 3 groups: Humans and Aliens and Robotic "races" and Animals. There is a reason to put Humans in one group with Aliens: Humans are Aliens to other Aliens. Animals are lifeforms with normal or low intelligence. They are comparable with Lions, Bears in original Civilization IV.

There can be religions in a SF mod. Only Humans have IRL religions like Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc. and future religions. Aliens can have only future religions. Animals cannot have any religions.

 

[Anima Croatorum]

Has anyone played Emperor of Fading Suns, or the Fading Suns RPG? It incorporates, empires and religion very well.