The TEN Dimensions of the Metaverse Coming...

Those sound great, what about one strong AI could be The Arnor or other name against all the AIs and the humans race? Could that be possible? Sort of our galaxy against some sort of extragalactic invasion. Kind like when the Fundamentalists appear but stronger.

How about something like:

Resource King: The galaxy only has a few habitable stars, but loads of resources. Whoever can control the resources can build enough of an empire to achieve a victory. No transports or Combat Transports allowed, so paths to victory could only be achieved through diplomacy, research or culture. Military would only be useful to destroy starbases.

Sound interesting to anyone?

How will diplomacy work on the scenarios based on alliances?
I mean specially about the possibility of my negotiating a peace treaty and not being dragged back to war in the next turn? Maybe the "abandoned" ally could get a compensation from me: money, ships, for x turns, as an indirect war effort help. Then if that is refused, the alliance is terminated and relations drop to cool or something like that.




To follow up on the AdmiralMayito suggestion, wouldn't it be possible to have the 2 new races coming from one of the borders of the game (the "sides" of the galaxy)?
Something like these two races had to abandon their homeworlds and colonies situated in some uncharted area of the galaxy because of some kind of spatial anomaly --- some startrek episodes could help here to fill in
.

The point being that they arrive in a galaxy that is preset, with most planets distributed among the usual races, (and alliances, trade ; or not, these could be options). They do not have a homeworld, but have their whole fleet, which includes transports and colony ships, and a warchest to beggin with. But from the moment they arrive they must settle: grab planets from the other players, who will all face a common enemy, or some may choose to ally with them, etc.
There was something like that for medieval total war and then the viking invasion.

For the suggestions you made, it sounds good. I'm only worried about the alliances thing.

~SDC~

Another question: Would there be somekind of fleet bonus in this case?

~SDC~

Picking up on your get to the center theme #2 above.

The evil spiral of death: Spiral galaxy, Huge abundant. Middle planets a bit better than those on the arms. All races start out on an arm or have random placement. No one starts on the better planets, however. All culture flipping turned off. All diplomacy turned off and all civs set to permanent war. All races set to evil. That means you couldn't culture bomb and win. You couldn't abuse the ai through diplomacy. And you couldn't use sneak attack alpha strikes as you're at war already. You'd have to slug it out and eliminate the others to win. HEHE dastardly.

No, I don't like the evil option, how about everybody pure good and only tech victory.

No, I don't like the evil option, how about everybody pure good and only tech victory.


Oh yes, Good idea. we could have goody lil two shoes virtuous spiral of peace and love. All races start on the arms, middle planets better than the rest. No war allowed. First to final frontier wins.

Don't forget those of us who are not in the masoverse.

Alex


~SDC~

Exactly, why just military conquest, what about diplomacy, science, wonders, culture, all these issues are more important than war.

Exactly, why just military conquest, what about diplomacy, science, wonders, culture, all these issues are more important than war

Actually he was asking for what might be a fun game, not some all encompassing philosophy debate. I thought mine would be fun. I thought yours might too. But a scenario that plays exactly like the game? What's the point when we already have the game?

Don't forget those of us who are not in the masoverse.

Alex


Of course. I think my spiral of death scenario would likely be played more on lower difficulties rather than just maso.

LOL

Indeed!

~SDC~

Catchup. The AIs are all dumb--after all, it was humanity invented the hyperdrive! However they've had a head start of hundreds of thousands of years on humanity, so they all start with a big tech lead and a big lead in colonization as well.

You are right Pontius, I think that we must have options that push the banner a little bit further.

I would like to see an Ironman Challenge.


* Player picks difficulty level, and that's all.

* Player has to receive a game start (or seed, or whatever is the minimum necessary to key a game) FROM THE METAVERSE.

* These factors randomized by the Metaverse: map size, cluster density, political party, all bonus abilities.

* Victory conditions and AI alignments always standard.

* No Ctrl-N, no rejecting of maps. Player MUST complete AND SUBMIT each game requested before being allowed to receive another Ironman game to try. (The Meta would need to save the current seed, start, or what have you, in case of hard drive crash or other fatal issue, so players could re-obtain the start in case of losing the files on their end).

* Either keep Ironman scoring separate from the standard Metaverse, or include only Ironman victories in the regular scoring, so that Ironman players are not penalizing their empires and other standings when posting losses.


This challenge would give players another way to compete, would put them into a variety of situations, and should be a lot of fun. But the key would be having to report each game before being able to play another. Without that, it would not be much of an "Ironman" event, would it?


- Sirian


EDIT: Oh One More Thing (TM). This would be more interesting if the Metaverse records and displays the randomized elements, to show on player's profile what political parties they were handed, what bonus abilities, what cluster density, in addition to the statistics already shown (alignment, map size, victory condition, etc).

[Message Edited]

I'd like a combination of the catchup with the "partners" and "dark earth" option. Earth came late to the game, and we start behind a few levels on tech. But we start out allied with the race that we first encountered, the Altarian or the Drengin. All alien races initally have more tech and a modest fleet of warships (maybe star fighters), and everyone other than your ally starts out cool-to-wary to you.

I concur with Sirian, this would be things somewhat spicy.

~SDC~

If these are to be seperate metaverse dimensions then I'd find galaxy size to be an important factor in the fun. I like tiny or small maps that can be completed in one sitting. As such my following suggestions are based on this.

a) Cluttered Space (small or tiny)
- each major empire starts with 1 single planet. All other habital planets are given to minor races. Minor races are given decent starting military ships (battleships maybe, but not the tech or else they'll trade it). All minors are resistant to culture flipping (carinoids). All victory conditions allowed.

How the mighty can fall (small or tiny)
- each major is given 1 planet and starts with a good alignment. A single major is given an evil alignment and all the remaining planets. The good majors need to work together as the evil empire can crush them all individually.

c) Fortune favours the brave (tiny)
- galaxy starts out totally full of egg anomalies. All majors are present. To get anywhere races must release space eels. Can you take the risk?

d) An empire sundered (small)
- Your federation has just split into civil war. All planets controlled by different minors. 1 single planet in the centre controlled by you. Each major has an invasion fleet at a corner of the map (2 transports, 2 star fighters). All races at war with all other races. Can you regain your empire?

Paul.

I have another idea: The Peacemaker.


Sol starts dead center in the galaxy. Evil on the left, Good on the right. (Or, if you're a Democrat, you could reverse that if you like). One small cluster of stars in the center, but the majority of stars tightly packed on the two sides and fairly balanced. No neutral civs. Three good, three evil, and the Humans.

To win, player must achieve Alliance victory with all major AI's surviving. Cultural victory, or Alliance victory with one or more AI's eliminated, would be a draw. Any other result would be a loss.

Since player would have only a few stars and planets, give them Trade-related bonuses. Perhaps Mercantile party, +20 Trade, +2 Trade Routes, and +10 Diplomacy.

Clearly, remaining Neutral would be the obvious strategy, since the goal is to befriend everybody.


- Sirian

how about a map where a minor holds a sector right in the middle of the map with lots of really good systems, and all the planets in that sector will already be colonized by that minor. the rest of the map will only contain 15 quality planets at the best, and all the major AI's and the human player will have 1 or 2 planets each on the edge of the map.

the objective of the game is to control over 50% of the planets in the center sector, which ever major civ does it first wins the game. to make the game more difficult, it is prohibited to trade or ally with the one minor holding the center sector. im guessing the center minor will only be allowed to trade with other minors, that way they will be able to make additional profit.

Keep in mind the winning conditions need to be kept very straight forward lest we get forum posts from angry users who found the conditions too complicated and confusing.

Here's a variation on Pontius's idea:

Medium galaxy, Sol dead center, with at least one sort-of-habitable planet besides Earth. AIs are spread in loose clusters around the outside; no yellow/purple stars close to Earth. The player will need to build stepping-stone colonies or starbases for range extenders to get any colonies before the AIs grab them all.

No minors, period.

Again, all races set permanently to war; culture flipping (and obviously trade) disabled. All victory conditions disabled except for Military.

On the lower difficulty levels, this should be a challenge for just about anybody. On Maso, it should be a nightmare. With a "standard," pre-determined map, Ctrl-N becomes virtually useless, and a permanent state of war means no tech trading for cash and no extortion for a peace treaty. No cheese, just a whole lot of shooting, and good tactics to make the most of Sol's limited resources.

I think the prospective scenarios "Partners" and "Dark Earth" are rather boring. I could play those out in a regular game. I'm more interested in unique but replayable situations like the other ones decribed.

Seven Wonders

Alter the Tech Tree slightly to add 12-15 special wonders . First race to build seven wins. Kinda like the ol' space race victory, but more exclusive. leans on diplomacy and infrastructure, but can be won militarily as well.