Theme Empires Discussion

from Stardock Forums
Alright, since the discussion is happening in 4 empire threads, thought we should centralise it here.

First of all, the Theme Confederation idea was mooted to present a different dimension of "conflict" on the Metaverse which could potentially involve many empires with their distinct identities. In no way am I advocating mergers. Though forming an informal grouping among empires may seem to be encouraging conformity, I like to see it as allowing diversity within an umbrella grouping.

The fact of the matter is that we do have 2 distinct categories of empires in this Metaverse. The theme empires and the locality empires. There is somewhat a balance of power between the two group with the localities currently ahead if we were to total up them up on scores.

It's a suggestion that may inject some excitement into our Metaverse MMORPG which is I feel slowing down a bit.

On a related topic, it would seem that both MWC and ANZAC may be considering a transformation to theme. That may make the proposed game unbalanced and thus unplayable but I say that would only be good for the MMORPG.

It is beyond doubt that the theme empires have been the most active contributors to the colour of Meta thus far with the exception of the ANZACs. We hardly hear from the Euros and the Canadians and also MWC besides the odd recruitment posts.

So I would certainly encourage them to theme, join in and add colour to the world that we have created on this board.
341 views 12 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top
Once I get few more pips on my lapel (I have three games ongoing right now, getting close to being postable) I'll be starting a semi-themed (optional for members) empire. Great concept, name, and flag - if recruitment works out I hope to be giving all you old timers a run for your money.... So for all of you who haven't quite found the right empire for you, you might want to wait a week or so until I show my colors....


[Message Edited]
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
Ack Xavier13, you posted this just when I posted something to interest you to join my empire in another thread.

Well, if you have aspirations to start your own theme empire, that's great.

No need to wait for pips, Xavier. Start now and get it up.
Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
Awesome, another masochistic player. Great! Nice to see more people step up to the challenge. I, on the other hand, have been suffering a streak of unluckiness on that difficulty.
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
Hmm.... Ok, well maybe I will start it up sooner rather than later. I'm agonizingly close to finishing up another crippling gigantic which I played quite differently from my last one, so I think I want to wrap that up first. Then I need at least an hour or two clear to create the communication thread and do up the flag. Look for it in the next couple days....
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
Theme empires tend to get more activity because that is what keeps the empire alive, continuation of the theme. With locality empires, passive presence is fine since by living where one lives membership is a matter of fact.

So to liven things up or attract more active members like the MWC and ANZAC want, they need to provide a theme. Also theme empires invariably have a better average member score.

It would be nice to have informal groupings for the betterment of the atmosphere on the forums, you know less trash-talking elevating to head-on arguments.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
The first thing to do is define where the other two empire classes go. Theme and locality were discussed, but website based (or club based) empires and empires of ego (usually one person operations) need to be placed. I suppose that empires supported by outside groups or web sites would qualify as locality, and that ego empires would have to be either totally discounted or be judged on a case by case basis if they are actually of size three or larger.

A quick look at the advantages and disadvantages of both theme and locality from Gerakken's viewpoint:

Locality: recruitment can be fairly simple. Prospective members have ties to the general geographic area covered by the empire and join it. Easy to find, easy to join. The bad news is that they can fall into the trap of non-participation on the forum and can suffer from elitism. In other words, they stay on their own private channels and interact mostly with each other (if they interact as a group at all) rather than interact with the forum in general. It can get so bad that it goes past simple "Us vs. Them" and right into the "nobody else matters" stage.

Theme empires: larger potential recruitment base, but can be harder to recruit into. The more eleborate the theme and the more defined the empire philosophy is, the harder it is to match people to it. Of course, some themes are innately more popular than others. And it takes some research to really learn what these guys are about, which also hurts recruitment. But once the members are in, Galciv forum participation is high compared to locality empires. There are more shining forum stars from theme empires. They tend to actively build up the forum community even while they have their role-playing havoc. There is a much smaller chance of being elitist since the members are more likely to interact with the forum than with only each other.

Now, onto promoting empires. My Major Empires project is a start, but not all of the top 10 are theme empires. And I only go part of the way by covering only the top 10 in a slow, irregular manner. But, to my credit, I do promote the growth of budding empires that are willing to participate on the forum by helping them along and hope that they will become theme empires one day. This is where Ray, Palpatine, and any others who want to help out come in: to market theme empires and to get more lone gunmen to come out of the shadows to join any empire at all and just participate in the forum. But, of course, we would want more lone gunmen to join theme empires than the locality empires! :)
Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
Ok, now that my empire has completed its renovations, I can rededicate my attention to this fledgling idea. Ray are you on now?

~SDC~
Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
Rightieho. Much of the fun of the Boards for me, is interacting with players from around the world, and building an image of their character from their posts.
Most threads are game problem related. A few threads are Metaverse and Empire related. The latter are the threads where the chattier players go, and those are the ones I read. For me, there are 5 interesting (kooky?) threads: GROSS, the Fellowship, the Republic, the ANZACs and CariElf Fanclub. This may also say something about Aussies (who are generally kookier than kiwis I think). The MWC plays it pretty straight.
The Euros, Canadian Empire and the old behemoths don't interact.

This says to me that location based empires generally don't require much imagination to join, and don't engender much creativity to stay. What is the point of having empires if there is no positive, fun interaction?

My conclusion is that theme empires are where I want to hang out. Probably this is true of a few ANZACs too. The final destination and the process is unclear to me however. :notsure:
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
Just following through from the ANZAC thread - I'd echo Drop Bear's thoughts; I love ANZAC's cultural theme but want to freshen up, and also want the chance to attract new players - little chance of that with a locality empire. One problem is coalescing empires, and ending up with 2-3 huge ones - no good for the Metaverse or us, I think. Colour and diversity are important.
Reply #11 from Stardock Forums Top
My vision for the Theme Confederation is to create an umbrella body of active and outward-looking theme empires, each with their distinct identities.

The Theme / Locality World War is a suggestion to give this Confederation a common purpose and hopefully to stir up more excitement in the Metaverse.

We would still have our solo empire competitions for the Top Spot as I know many still enjoy that. But this World War gives participants something to shout about even if they are not in a position to compete for #1.

The Fellowship is trying to dream up some additional fun stuff for the Metaverse Empires such as Empire Olympiads where each empire would send its rep/s to compete. Or Sequential games where players take turns to play a normal Galciv game. All this is done for the purpose of trying to increase the fun level in this forum (which is as fun a forum I've ever participated in) and also hopefully to keep the game fresh even for the vets. Michael Casey's Game of the Month and CDG Empire's Democracy game falls into the second category.

End of the day, our intent is to look for more healthy and fun interaction for us all and to enhance the entire Galciv experience.

[Message Edited]
Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top
You're a trooper Ray. I almost hope Dropbear doesn't track you down in Middle Earth and do his expose. You just don't deserve that.