WISHLIST: Beyond Earth 2

[blackbutterfly]

With the recent hint of a sequel to Beyond Earth by Firaxis' Civ account on Twitter, post what you would like to see in the game.

 

[blackbutterfly]

Aquatic gameplay in Beyond Earth is my favorite aspect (as you don't have it in historical Civ) but I thought there was much to be desired of the aquatic elements of maps.

MAP:

• Underwater canyons (and/or Trenches) - BE had impassible canyons on land, but how about underwater canyons too. Maybe with a movement penalty, acting like underwater rivers? A combat bonus perhaps? For subs?
• Volcanos - assuming a climate system for BE2, primordial worlds will be expected to be volcanic. And underwater volcanos also.
• Meteors & Impact Zones - Civ VI Apocalypse mode already has this feature. For primordial worlds. Perhaps just 1-tile impact zones for balance?
• Aquatic thermal vents - Not just a resource but a feature around which there can be multiple resources. And science bonus. (As vents are thought to support life and scientists believe they could do so similarly on exoplanets).
• Transcendence - Not really anything to do with SMAC/X but in Civ VI humanity irreversibly wreck the planet resulting in sea level rises and loss of coastal lands. Just like BE has no nukes, perhaps humanity will alter the world but in the opposite. i.e. making it more habitable and Earth-like. Terraforming.

 

[Darsnan]

Aquatic gameplay in Beyond Earth is my favorite aspect (as you don't have it in historical Civ) but I thought there was much to be desired of the aquatic elements of maps.

MAP:

• Underwater canyons (and/or Trenches) - BE had impassible canyons on land, but how about underwater canyons too. Maybe with a movement penalty, acting like underwater rivers? A combat bonus perhaps? For subs?
• Volcanos - assuming a climate system for BE2, primordial worlds will be expected to be volcanic. And underwater volcanos also.
• Aquatic thermal vents - Not just a resource but a feature around which there can be multiple resources. And science bonus. (As vents are thought to support life and scientists believe they could do so similarly on exoplanets).
• Transcendence - Not really anything to do with SMAC/X but in Civ VI humanity irreversibly wreck the planet resulting in sea level rises and loss of coastal lands. Just like BE has no nukes, perhaps humanity will alter the world but in the opposite. i.e. making it more habitable and Earth-like. Terraforming.

I don't play much on waterworlds, but I like these ideas! Also, how about the following:

1. Aquatic equivalent of a marsh (movement and tile bonus penalties until removed) that needs to be removed, but instead of being a natural feature like a marsh its actually another Progenitor remnant that in order to be accessed, it needs to have a worker "improve" the tile. Example: instead of an explorer performing a dig, its the worker clearing away the waste/debris to reveal a Progenitor bonus, maybe giving a cultural bonus (like "we've successfully cleared away the eons of debris to reveal a beautiful underwater garden!").
2. Orbital artifacts: so say the explorer excavates a site on the surface that is actually the control center for a Progenitor satellite of some sort that can then be deployed (or moved?) to the players desired location, much like the explorer-recovered solar collectors can be deployed now.

 

[blackbutterfly]

I don't play much on waterworlds, but I like these ideas! Also, how about the following:

1. Aquatic equivalent of a marsh (movement and tile bonus penalties until removed)

Yes, like kelp.

Originally that was in SMAC but really should be in regular Civ like in Sukritact's Oceans mod. Not just Japan but many Asian and Pacific cultures harvested sea weed.

 

[vorlon_mi]

BERT does have an aquatic tile type, "Trench", that can be traversed over but not improved. Aquatic cities may not move over a trench. Not quite the same as impassable mountains on land, but similar to the BERT "Canyon" terrain type on land. Hover vehicles can move over it, but it can't be improved.

My biggest wish is an improvement for the Explorer units. Give them some buffs due to techs or affinity progress -- able to move more than 2 hexes per turn, and give them the ability to hover over ice. Every. Single. Game. has at least one expedition site that is surrounded by polar ice making them unreachable.

Other than bug fixes / bug avoidances, my wish list includes:
More interactions with the orbital layer. The Rocktopus is a good first effort, but allow more units to ascend/descend. Allow certain orbital unit types to shift their position.
Different types of aircraft (air defense vs. bombers), and different options for basing them. Given that outposts take a while to grow into cities, supporting a moving battle front is harder. Either carriers (on water) or the unique Aquilon (on land); maybe a worker action to build an airbase?
Add a map-based replay feature, as some other Civ games do, so that you can see who built which cities, when wonders were built, and so on.
Make it clearer how to add an aquatic city to your internal trade network. If there are specific buildings to be built, or certain minimum distances, put that in the Civilopedia.

Less well-formed ideas --
I like that Rising Tide did a reboot / rethink about diplomacy. There are aspects of traditional Civ diplomacy that I miss, such as resource trading, tech trading, or bribing to declare war/peace, but that goes against the reboot. Not sure how to combine the old and new. I do think that the AI in BERT are very opaque about why they will not accept peace, and are much too willing to sacrifice their entire empire in a futile last stand. I would like some more relationship states than just "Neutral/Cooperating/Allied". How about, "Hey, stop attacking that station I'm trading with!"

In Civ4 and Civ6, city specialization could pay dividends. Not every city got every building or district. In BERT, my cities are nearly all alike. Perhaps certain wonders / projects / national wonders would give an incentive to specialize them.

 

[legalizefreedom]

I only have one wish for BE2.

A full and complete development cycle.

Everything else is gravy.

 

[blackbutterfly]

BERT does have an aquatic tile type, "Trench", that can be traversed over but not improved. Aquatic cities may not move over a trench. Not quite the same as impassable mountains on land, but similar to the BERT "Canyon" terrain type on land. Hover vehicles can move over it, but it can't be improved.

I have 1500hrs of BE but either I forgot about this feature completely or maybe I did not even know it exists.

But it is a hidden feature right?
Like there's no special graphic for it.

 

[legalizefreedom]

I have 1500hrs of BE but either I forgot about this feature completely or maybe I did not even know it exists.

But it is a hidden feature right?
Like there's no special graphic for it.

There are very few on each map and they look no different than ocean that I know of. They usually reveal themselves to me after I've settled the city. They are a pain since they are just dead hexes. You can't improve them at all.

 

[Aldor]

Some unsorted thoughts:
- resource outposts: You need oil for your satellite, but "forgot" to settle a city appropriately? It would be great if you could build a resource outpost to harvest that resource outside your territory.
- generally, ability to build some (military) improvements outside your territory: for example forts, flight strips, ...
- colossal aliens should be weaker, but much more aggressive (even if you haven't attacked other aliens)
- change diplomacy: alliances are simple not worth it IMO, because the AI just loves to go to war pointlessly and drags you into those wars. Having an option for purely defensive alliences would be nice
- victory: I'm not fond of the "ganging up" once you start your victory wonder, where even friendly factions will attack
- victory: change contact victory so that it's less chance based. Getting some parts of the signal should help you, but not give you a huge jump-start compared to everyone else. Make research a lot more important for this victory.

 

[blackbutterfly]

There are very few on each map and they look no different than ocean that I know of. They usually reveal themselves to me after I've settled the city. They are a pain since they are just dead hexes. You can't improve them at all.

Re: Trenches.
Yeah, that's pretty rubbish. They're hidden and pretty rare.

I mean proper trenches that like mountains or rivers can be seen.
On Earth fault lines run similar to rivers systems in the oceans separating the continental plates.

From a gameplay perspective, you probably won't want to settle too close to fault lines for quakes and volcanos destroying your cities.

 

[vorlon_mi]

Despite some of the criticism here about them, I enjoy several of the leaders in BE(RT). Yes, having an alien leader would also be cool.

What about this idea? Having a leader / sponsor be the great-great-great-(great)^8 grandson or granddaughter of a historical leader from old Earth? To expand the pool of sponsors and allow some additional storytelling?

While playing last night, I noticed that NSA settled a bunch more cities than usual. After the first few UK-flavoured city names, I started seeing names that looked Norwegian/Swedish. What??? Oh, yes, of course. "North Sea Alliance."

But expanding the pool of leaders/sponsors to include descendants of European, North American, African or Asian leaders would avoid some of the combinations that quashed their individuality. Not that these new leaders would be trying to re-create their ancient empires; they could take on the passions, the attitude, some elements of the culture of their ancestors.

 

[blackbutterfly]

Despite some of the criticism here about them, I enjoy several of the leaders in BE(RT). Yes, having an alien leader would also be cool.

Analysis of BE sponsors:

ARC = Americas North + Mexico(?). Spies.
Brasilia = Brasil. Militarist.
Franco Iberia = France + Spain. Cultural.
NSA = Scotland + Norway. Aquatic.
Slavic Fed = USSR. Orbital.
People's Africa = Africa. Foodie.
Pan Asia = East Asia. Wonders.
Kavithan = India. Expansionist.
Polystralia = Australia + Polynesia = Traders.
Chungsu = Korea. Hackers.

You could do the same with SMAC/X but you will find their character matches their traits:
the granola Lady Deidre who was the "green" faction,
oriental hive mind dude,
the worker,
the peacekeeper,
the sister,
the space pirate. Etc.

In BE the trait is sort of hidden behind the historical/national identities.
That was a mistake IMO.

TBH civ design at Firaxis has improved considerably since BE. In Civ VI and its scenarios. Notably Red Death.
The civs in that scenario are really good.

So here's hoping Firaxis doesn't repeat BE's mistake and give us a more character driven set of sponsors for BE2

What about this idea? Having a leader / sponsor be the great-great-great-(great)^8 grandson or granddaughter of a historical leader from old Earth?

This is a good idea!
For example:

Gandhi.
His progeny is then a peacekeeper. (Instead of expansionist South Asian Kavitha)

Genghis Khan
Mongolian/Asian dude (or woman) is militarist.

And in this case the character can easily be a descendent of Genghis because there is evidence that 0.5% of male population are his descendants. You will have to look that up.

 

[Vandlys]

To add to the above, I've always dreamed of playing a continuation from Civ V / Civ VI, where you can upload a save file after having achieved a science victory and play a new game with the Civ you finished with in the "regular" franchise. Maybe a cool bonus or personalised thing could be attached.

 

[KayAU]

Good thread.

A couple of things I have thought about earlier, which I don't think have been mentioned yet:
1. A World Congress/Planetary Council system. I think this is something which would have come with a second expansion to BE, if the game had been more successful. It worked brilliantly in SMAC, and I'm sure it could in BE as well.
2. Landmarks/natural wonders. These add life and variety to the map, and would have been excellent additions IMO. To make them even better, you could spin some narrative around them, or even make them part of diplomacy by adding planetary council resolutions related to some of them.

 

[KayAU]

@blackbutterfly

Excellent summary of the BE factions, and I agree with you. The SMAC factions and leaders were so clear and distinctive, I can still mostly remember their names and quotes without looking them up. I can definitely remember their personalities. As I read through your post, I could clearly visualize Sister Miriam Goodwinson, Chairman Domai, Commisioner Pravin Lal, and so on. SMAC is a game which did most things very well, both mechanically (a couple of standout features being Social Engineering and the Planetary Council), and in terms of narrative and atmosphere. I agree that "hiding" the defining traits behind former national identities in BE was a mistake, and just a reminder of how clear this was in SMAC:

There's no doubt what each of these are, as both the name of the faction, the quote from the leader, and the leader archetype is written right there. In Alien Crossfire, the faction selector also showed the bonuses and the background of each leader:

You may note that the leader quote is missing from the text here, but I think it was played as an audio clip when you clicked on the faction.

I love BE, but I think SMAC remains the gold standard, and I wish more games would learn from it.

 

[legalizefreedom]

SMAC is one of my favorites, but I always played the same faction. The downside of having pigeonholed leaders.

One option could be to have a starting philosophy and an evolving personality based in part on your decisions, esp regarding affinity. Like starting as a neutral jedi in a star wars game and gradually changing based on light or dark decisions.

 

[KayAU]

@legalizefreedom

While I had a favorite faction (no prizes for guessing which one), I actually varied which ones I played quite a lot. Most frequently I would go for University, Gaia's Stepdaughters (what a name), or Peacekeeping Forces, but sometimes I would mix it up a bit with Morgan Industries, Manifold Caretakers, or the Cybernetic Consciousness. I think I tried the rest as well, but just once or very rarely.

I really like how the different factions interacted with Social Engineering. Your faction basically had stats, and the effects where profound.

 

[legalizefreedom]

Yes, my faction was the University as well. Seemed like a no brainer. I did try out the other original factions. Stepdaughters and Morgan were alright.

 

[s0nny80y]

I want something similar to Civ 4 BTS' Final Frontier!

 

[HorseshoeHermit]

Analysis of BE sponsors:

ARC = Americas North + Mexico(?). Spies.
Brasilia = Brasil. Militarist.
Franco Iberia = France + Spain. Cultural.
NSA = Scotland + Norway. Aquatic.
Slavic Fed = USSR. Orbital.
People's Africa = Africa. Foodie.
Pan Asia = East Asia. Wonders.
Kavithan = India. Expansionist.
Polystralia = Australia + Polynesia = Traders.
Chungsu = Korea. Hackers.

You could do the same with SMAC/X but you will find their character matches their traits:
the granola Lady Deidre who was the "green" faction,
oriental hive mind dude,
the worker,
the peacekeeper,
the sister,
the space pirate. Etc.

In BE the trait is sort of hidden behind the historical/national identities.
That was a mistake IMO.

It's the right analysis but I don't like the cost of throwing the very idea of a more plural, less ideological basis for a faction, just to get the game to be punchy. SMAC had extremely radical ideological factions, based as cults of personality around extremely radical ideologues from the original crew, and its plot was based on this from top to bottom. BE tried - and succeeded - in creating a halfway decent set of, more fleshed out political bodies, and the speculative historical picture of their formation. At the same time, they hid the wrong things behind obscurity or ambiguity.
Certainly, banking on the animated leaderheads getting them through the same way as Civ V was a pure mistake. They missed the thing there, they caught later: People recognize the historical figures; that's doing over half the work.
Ebner and Sochua and Hutama were interesting people. But they need to play off of something else to make us accept them, if they take again the route of being less extreme in the ideologies of the factions.
I want to see... how to describe it... the politically realistic basis of factions, again. Imagining these things forming *on Earth*, under only the crisis conditions of Earth, not a seedship crew and hero worship.