New DLC

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zolobolo
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New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Sun Jun 09, 2019 5:33 pm

I know you cannot give out any details on upcoming DLCs but am really looking forward to an expansion

The planetary degredation update (if it comes) I feel should be part of update for the base game and the DLC should definitively include a new faction and focus on some aspect like starbases, areay of weapons or ground invasion

I feel there is already enough pop mechanic (moral, slaves and harmonization) that can be fleshed out and does not need more

Whatever is chosen, please make sure the AI is able to use it.
Example: I feel the AI needed additional attention after Tinkers DLC to be able to play the faction with their moving bases and harmonisation mechanic

There are also existing tech and mechanics that can be fleshed out as they are currently not used:
- Asteroid dases
- Mercs
- Starbases (AI never uses these)
- Interraction with Marauders, pirates and Arda Seed

Speaking of Arda Seed: Hope they get more attention with the next update as well (lore, unique tech, interactions, galaxy map actions, ships, game functions such as endgame crisis are all welcome for them :))

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Arioch
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Re: New DLC

Postby Arioch » Sun Jun 09, 2019 10:10 pm

The new DLC focuses on expanding the terraforming mechanic, and the new faction has special terraforming abilities.

I would like to include the ecological damage model in the updated terraforming mechanics, but we'll see how it works out.

Attached are some concept images related to the new DLC.

gardeners designs II 7 pretty.jpg
gardeners designs II 7 pretty.jpg (472.51 KiB) Viewed 103242 times
Attachments
arid transition in game.jpg
arid transition in game.jpg (359.37 KiB) Viewed 103784 times
terraforming_chart1.png
terraforming_chart1.png (1.12 MiB) Viewed 103784 times

evil713
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Re: New DLC

Postby evil713 » Mon Jun 10, 2019 4:57 am

Slurpee World?

Huh, I wonder if there is a science penalty cause of brainfreeze.

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PrivateHudson
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Re: New DLC

Postby PrivateHudson » Mon Jun 10, 2019 7:34 am

The ships are looking awesome!

zolobolo wrote:- Starbases (AI never uses these)

I encounter AI-built starbases quite often (current Steam testing branch).

zolobolo
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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Mon Jun 10, 2019 8:49 am

Arioch wrote:I would like to include the ecological damage model in the updated terraforming mechanics, but we'll see how it works out.

If the model is independent from the terraforming attributes of the planets (temp and pressure), it can be implemented independently right?
Like if it uses a different metric of a planet such as "devastation" or "pollution" (though I got a bad taste in my mouth for the latter due to MoO

Or just name it straight up "Ecological damage" and reduce habitabiltiy and fertifility (or just fertility and habitability might derive from that I dont exactly know)

But if you plan to inegrate the ecological damage model with the above changes necessary for the terraforming model I would advise against it as it would be strange to have a planet change type due to damage - I feel this should be something visible and unique not just a drop in planet type

I love the sheet of your concept: there is so much thought and work put into it, it is truly great to read through :)
See you find yourself in a predicement for the Orthin as they can only go from Iceball to Ocean there. How you might get from Ocean to Island is a good questions: building artificial islands seems a bit too out there.
How abouth this: "Dehydration": some tecnological means of getting rid of huge amounts of water, yes:
"Fusion terraforming" (unique or not to Orthin): By separating the water molecules and fusing together H atoms into He, this technology allows the:
1. Constant reduction of water mass (bringing natural eleavations of the seabed above surface=islands)
2. Produces energy which can be used to heat up the atmoshere and threby inrease mean temp
3. Produces Oxygen which is both good four your breathing AND it forms Ozon on the higher atmosphere making the newly formed islands habitable for life

BLACK HOLE: yes, this sounds awesome, are you really planning to have some, or are you just very diligent in the concept? :)

On the tech side: I imagine having read through the concept that you plan to have different technologies for the various terraforming actions: this is great (especially if art goes into tech with it always should otherwise the tech window is dry), but how would the player know which tech is best for them under the current faction and planets they have?

If you are keeping in line with your principle used during habitabiltiy of havign a solid if complex system largely hidden from the player and only showing vital information to them I would imagine this would mean that sohwing such complex and thorough graphs and flowcharts not viable (though it would and does look awesome).
When terraforming a planet directly today, we can see what the options are and by showing how much the total pop increase/decreases solves that part of the process (just make sure to use the same fat +green or -red indicators like during pop transport in the end :)), but tech is a bit more difficult.
Something like: Tech: "Planetary Heating Concepts": "Allows terraformation into Arid and Dessert type planets" but feels dry a bit

Ideally, the color coding is kept and the player is trained in the workflow by showing the diagram, where the current planet is and having to select the next stage within the diagram but that woudl mean new GUI window/concept and a bit of complexity. Though selection from such a chart should be intuitive for most and if they see: I would realyl like a Megacity, that sounds great, you could see right away what tech you need to research for that

Lastly on visualisation of terraforming: I feel that terraformed planets need to be visualised as such somewhere. Does not need to be on systme view, maybe just on the planetary info page. If you have icons for the terraforming tech that could be stamped on this window to show what was applied and on what level the planet is. Giving levels to the planets also would give hte feeling of working towards some ideal concept and gives progression. Both would make terraforming stand out and when you conquer a planet you would see: Wow, this planet has been terraformed by the AI and made much more valuable thank you AI!

Ship concepts are flawless like always: Design is very alian (almost Arda like but more techy which I was hoping for :)). From the colors, I found Triton to suite them bettter as Musel seems to come off a bit more blurry to me.

MY favorite design is the Escort: great proportions and streamlined form, with close second for Dreadnought: this guy seems truly formiddable and the double tail gives it a stand-out siluette from the others: did you consider already giving two tails to the Battlecruiser and 3 to the Dreadnought?

The Explorer I find too big for its role and alongated: sohrter and stubby version might be more appropriate
Similarly: Partol Cruiser could do with a bit of shorter tail to fit right between the lenght of Partol Cruiser and War Cruiser
Smalls crafts interceptor on the right looks very cool (is the one on the left an alternate concept to that?), shuttle awesome and bomber is ok but how giving this also two and much more stubby tails?

On station: I would suggest some assimetry in the design for mleft to wight (like in case of the other races) as currently it is geommetrically very perfect which might suite the race perfectly, but looks less intersting to look at (we need some assimetry in one way or another to find things really interaging)

Transport is interesting, I try to imagine how you will visualise the empty, civil/military carg for this: are they using hte same cargo format (would make sense but also strange for a race with this design)

Speakong of design: the whole race looks awesomely alien especially the pops
I hope you will find a way to show off the Adult Cluster somwhere, but hope to see the Adult version as the pop icon when managing them on planets and transports as Worker and Hunter might be a bit strange there but Adult represnetation would fit in nicely I think

Sorry to ramble along so much - as you can tell, really excited for the content :)

zolobolo
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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Mon Jun 10, 2019 10:35 am

What if there was a terraforming building (improvement) which would practically be built every time terraforming is conducted (changing one attribute of a planet)?

This way, it would be visible right away if and how many times a planet has been terraformed and if the terraforming tech icon is displayed on the top right of the building for example, also what kind of terraforming it was.

The improvement would naturally not be decomissionable, and since each terraforming action would take up a slot, it would be a payoff for the higher fertiflity and population the planet can sustain.

Lore wise also no problem: each terraforming action would be conducted via such a construction which would need to remain operational even after the terraforming has been conducted, else the planet would revert to its "natural" state defined by its size and proximity to its star

This mechanic would also allow for the habitabilti degradation mechanic but only for terraformed planets (as these have the building) and would still not be ideal the planet having to switch types within 1 turn - would be strange but the mechanic would make sense

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Arioch
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Re: New DLC

Postby Arioch » Mon Jun 10, 2019 10:47 am

zolobolo wrote:
Arioch wrote:I would like to include the ecological damage model in the updated terraforming mechanics, but we'll see how it works out.

If the model is independent from the terraforming attributes of the planets (temp and pressure), it can be implemented independently right?
Like if it uses a different metric of a planet such as "devastation" or "pollution"

The pollution/fallout would be a different metric, but I could see it interacting with the terraforming system. Heavy ecological damage could affect the temperature of the planet ("nuclear winter"), which might push the terraforming meter in one direction or the other.

zolobolo wrote:BLACK HOLE: yes, this sounds awesome, are you really planning to have some, or are you just very diligent in the concept? :)

We don't currently have a gameplay use for one. Some of the things I had in mind for them we ended up doing with Hyperspace Anomalies instead.

zolobolo wrote:On the tech side: I imagine having read through the concept that you plan to have different technologies for the various terraforming actions: this is great (especially if art goes into tech with it always should otherwise the tech window is dry), but how would the player know which tech is best for them under the current faction and planets they have?

I'm not sure yet what kind of UI or limitations we will need so that the player won't accidentally perform a terraforming action that is not beneficial. We can figure that out once the system is working. Probably the simplest method is simply to only make beneficial projects available, which is kind of what we do now.

The state diagram is not something I'm planning to put in the UI. The temperature and atmospheric pressure, etc., will be stats you can track in the planetary status screen.

zolobolo wrote:Transport is interesting, I try to imagine how you will visualise the empty, civil/military carg for this: are they using hte same cargo format (would make sense but also strange for a race with this design)

It should have cargo/population variations like the other transports.

zolobolo wrote:Speakong of design: the whole race looks awesomely alien especially the pops
I hope you will find a way to show off the Adult Cluster somwhere, but hope to see the Adult version as the pop icon when managing them on planets and transports as Worker and Hunter might be a bit strange there but Adult represnetation would fit in nicely I think

The four population types will show up as separate pop groups, as they are managed separately.

zolobolo wrote:What if there was a terraforming building (improvement) which would practically be built every time terraforming is conducted (changing one attribute of a planet)?

There should be multiple ways of generating terraforming "points" toward the desired next stage, which should include a production task, specialized buildings, orbital infrastructure, and innate population abilities. The stages should be expensive and take a lot of effort, but each stage should provide a benefit.

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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Mon Jun 10, 2019 2:43 pm

Arioch wrote:The pollution/fallout would be a different metric, but I could see it interacting with the terraforming system. Heavy ecological damage could affect the temperature of the planet ("nuclear winter"), which might push the terraforming meter in one direction or the other.

Sounds good: nuclear winter is the only adverse affect I can think of though as pressure should not be affected by bombardment

Arioch wrote:We don't currently have a gameplay use for one. Some of the things I had in mind for them we ended up doing with Hyperspace Anomalies instead.

I would love to see them: there have been a number of very cool represenation of black holes (lastly in the last Orville episode of S2). They are cool as starsystems alone from a style perspective having 0 chance for habitable star systems. Making them the curent hypernodes would make sense and since is an already existing concept I think it would fit better instead of the current static nodes. The Arda could still have set up shop in them and have their node simply reside within such a system utilizing the naturaly gravity well of the black star for their gates

But there would need to be another gameplay element to rectify their existence I suppose - how abouth anomalies?
Reaching a black hole first could yields some random tech progress (most likely in physics), or ship wreck might be in abundance here. If black holes only exist on the map when hosting Arda, they could serve as an anchor system that allows other gamplay mechanics to be enabled such es the destruction or general changing of Hyperspace node (as they could behave like Arda starbases)

Arioch wrote:The state diagram is not something I'm planning to put in the UI. The temperature and atmospheric pressure, etc., will be stats you can track in the planetary status screen.

How abouth in a research description?
This way the player can still look ut up if they are interested

Arioch wrote:The four population types will show up as separate pop groups, as they are managed separately.

So the cluster or the single Adult variant will not be used?
If there is a pop growth project, the cluster variant might fit there perfectly...

Arioch wrote:There should be multiple ways of generating terraforming "points" toward the desired next stage, which should include a production task, specialized buildings, orbital infrastructure, and innate population abilities. The stages should be expensive and take a lot of effort, but each stage should provide a benefit.

Like the sound of specialized building and infrastructure and really having stages that all provide additional benefits. Sounds all very itneresting. Hope it will not be overly complex for the AI to use

zolobolo
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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Mon Jun 10, 2019 7:54 pm

Did you already find a sutiable color for the new faction on the galaxy map?

There must be only few more options available as there are two cases where the colors are very close for comfort:
Phidi and Raider yellow
Tinker and Yoral Green

Non-playable factions also take up soem of the remaining options such as grey, black or white

Some shades of Purple might not conflict with Haduir, or pink (though not a great color for an intersellar empire but who knows :))

Always playing huge ellipse galaxy with all factions so there is usually a lot of mixing of the fleets and systems going around in my games and withouth the empire borders, insignia and FoF coloring of fleet routes, it would be a mess

The Triton design suggest a mix of brown and creme... if that jives well with Arda fleet colors should fit nicely

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Arioch
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Re: New DLC

Postby Arioch » Mon Jun 10, 2019 8:17 pm

I expect it will be some variant of purple.

AMX
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Re: New DLC

Postby AMX » Tue Jun 11, 2019 8:46 am

zolobolo wrote:
Arioch wrote:The pollution/fallout would be a different metric, but I could see it interacting with the terraforming system. Heavy ecological damage could affect the temperature of the planet ("nuclear winter"), which might push the terraforming meter in one direction or the other.

Sounds good: nuclear winter is the only adverse affect I can think of though as pressure should not be affected by bombardment

Various kinds of contamination could reduce habitability without affecting the basic parameters.
(Presumably this would only affect species that are normally well-suited for the available biomes - if you have to stay inside a habitat dome anyway, it doesn't matter all that much if the air outside is even more toxic than usual.)

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Arioch
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Re: New DLC

Postby Arioch » Tue Jun 11, 2019 5:16 pm

AMX wrote:(Presumably this would only affect species that are normally well-suited for the available biomes - if you have to stay inside a habitat dome anyway, it doesn't matter all that much if the air outside is even more toxic than usual.)

A good point. I think ideally the presence of ecological damage should decrease the value of biomes for the inhabiting race as it scales up.

In theory, toxins like radiation could reduce the habitability to zero, but that's wouldn't be much fun as a game condition, since there would be no way of getting out of it.

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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Tue Jun 11, 2019 5:58 pm

You mena hitting the habitability derived from the bioms directly?
How would that be displayed/communicated to the user?

Diverse affects due to bombing need to be kidna permanent otherwise they can be overcome via production/money easily negating their sense and causing micro MGMT

Ideally I imagine such affects to be a permanent degradation to the planet (like the permanent improvement: "Devastated Ruins" I have proposed in an old topic where thi topic came up)

But if they are not permanent they could still:
1. Have a very long (depending on the intensity of the bombardment) counter untill automatically lifted with the aim of a truly devastating bombardment of a large fully inhabitad and build up planet should send that planet into the lowest colonisable habitat state for a 100 turns or so. Tech might exist to reduce the counter from early game on but needs to have serveral level to scale slowly up and still keep some penalty to the bombardier (but when applied automatically it would also no cause micro MGMT)
2. Only allow a clearing project to directly reduce the effect but withouth buyout option. The project could also some with mid to late tech requirement and additional upgrades might be made available for the project to increase its efficency somehwat. If such a project is designed its effect would need to be weighted to the pop growth effect of city planning

A countdown timer independently from planet params and habitat info would have the benefit of being clearly visible as well as its effect and number of turns left till lifted

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Arioch
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Re: New DLC

Postby Arioch » Tue Jun 11, 2019 7:15 pm

The gameplay purpose behind adding bombardment damage is to add a consequence to excessive bombardment to make it more of a choice, and to add a speed brake on one faction that is steamrolling another. It also, I think, adds an element of realism, since I don't think you can really bomb a planet back to the stone age and then set up shop there yourself as if nothing had ever happened.

Making bombardment damage permanent doesn't really serve either purpose. Ecological damage is not permanent in the sense that fallout eventually goes away, and ecosystems eventually recover. Ruins can be cleared and rebuilt. And from a gameplay perspective, having bombardment permanently destroy a world effectively removes it as an option.

My simple idea is to have fallout/pollution be a state with a metric, which reduces habitability until it is cleared by the use of a production task. The cost of the task can be scaled to offer the desired severity of penalty. I agree that this is probably a case where there shouldn't be a buyout button. The same will probably be true of terraforming tasks.

In addition to UI elements, the bombardment damage can be displayed visually on the planet graphic with the addition of black clouds. Different environmental techs could offer increased efficiency of the cleanup process.

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Re: New DLC

Postby zolobolo » Wed Jun 12, 2019 5:14 pm

Sounds perfect - guess it will also not be dependant on the new DLC then which is good being an important exploit fix

Suggest to make it clear somehow (hint or other way) that buyout is not available for the "construction"
If it is a project, that woudl be perfect, as they do not have buyout anyhow so it is intuitive to assume this one cannot be bought out either

Yes, it is a mayor exploit which I would assume almost all players utilize (btu the AI not so much). This way, huge and densly populated planets can captured within 2-3 turns and a single Tank. The player just watches the probabilty for a succesfull invasion and hopes that maybe 1-2 pops will remain (all buildings are more then likely to be eridacted). If this affect also randomly gets stronger, the adverse affects should pile up rapdily with each bombing run and the player discouraged to carry on, or having such devastated planets in abundance

On that note: moral penalty due to environmental damage would also be prudent so that keeping peace eis more difficult on these planets (even with newly transported pops that are not affected by the captured population or bombing effect) - though it might be argued that bombing moral penalty already exists for this purpose but like said above, it does not affect all pops. If it does, a few tanks need to be stationed on such planets for a longer period and preventing players from conquering entire empires with 2-3 tank battalions :)


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