During a recent exchange with Johann Gambolputty he brought up the word (or rather the concept) scarcity. Scarcity, what is it? What exactly did he mean? I’m not talking about the dictionary definition here but rather how this word or concept will benefit project Space Sector. How then can a word, which by its very nature means less of some thing be fun? How can less be more? To begin with one must pay attention to the Devs and understand part of the concept they are trying to bring to life. Once this is done it is fairly easy to determine that the Devs are going with an approach that could be generally described as quality over quantity. It is there in the shipbuilding thread as well as other places. It is also evident that the Devs are trying to set a certain pace in the game in order to better control and predict the flow of the game. What’s that you say? I don’t want the devs to control the pace of the game you think as a first reaction… oh but you do. You just want it done in a way where it is impossible to notice it. Right about this point some of you may be thinking that I started drinking early this morning but give me a few minutes here and I will explain. The fact is that most 4x games try to dictate the pace of the game, the problem is the way they do it. Stellaris, in an attempt to control the pace, uses (among other things) a concept of war score and only being able to take three planets from a foe at a time. Really? So let me get this straight, I steamroll an opponent, occupy all their worlds during hostilities but can only ask to annex 3 worlds? Do you know what my solution would be in real life? Genocide them and take all their worlds. No, if you want to control the pace of the game do it but not while asking me to suspend my intellect. Now let’s look at Moo2. This was a great game but also had tremendous room for improvement which could have been done without radical changes. Any of you that played the game invariably understood that the game was won or lost far earlier than when it ended. Do you remember looking at the graphs where one faction was so far ahead that you needed a magnifying glass to see the rest? This was poor control of the pace. So how do you control or slow down the pace of the game in a manner that the player will not notice and make the game more enjoyable, not less? many ways, one of those being scarcity. Scarcity does not mean empty. One can have huge galaxy maps that are full of interesting bodies and discoveries and still apply scarcity. Matthias and Possibility wrote quite a lot on this already in the thread “some thoughts on stars and planets” and there is the beginning. Moo2 suffered from lack of balance, at some point, you controlled a few systems that were brimming with highly productive worlds. The effects of this were runaway as your economy and production hit ludicrous speed. This then presents a dilemma for the Devs. They can’t keep the map size small as that would turn a lot of people off, they can however keep the number of highly productive worlds small and dictate the pace of development on those worlds quite easily and most importantly, naturally. But there’s more. Do you all remember the leader in Moo2 that brought terraforming technology with him if hired? God how I cringed when he showed up early, I knew if I took him that it was a huge advantage, it felt gamey. He needs to go. Further to that, terraforming should become much harder to achieve and in stages. In Moo2, once you found a Terran type world, you colonized it as if it were a new continent on Earth, this is wrong. Even with perfect gravity, atmosphere, etc. a colony here should be domed. (Alien virus and bacteria anyone?) The same should hold for any world that deviates from the factions ideal environment, domed. Look to SEV for effects of a dome, the planet will be limited to 25% of its potential while the colony is under a dome. The player can still expand early but the runaway effect is seriously curbed. Logical progression then would be that the first level of terraforming will effect M type planets, you can now get out from under the dome and live freely. After that, further expensive research in terraforming would allow planets that are close to being compatible to be altered to more friendly conditions. Some planets should even be considered unsuitable for terraforming entirely, similar to toxic in Moo2. Matthias could certainly provide some good information on this but the idea is simple, make terraforming a huge effort and in stages, make it take a long time, pace the game. This would still give the opportunity to fill the map with fascinating and interesting content. (Systems of a strategic value where supply stations and listening post can be erected) (Mining colonies) (Research colonies) (Artifacts) (Quests) (And all the other goodies you have planned or can think of) There are other ways to pace the game without changing the core vision Gravity generators, for a ship this could be early tech but for an entire planet very late tech, very expensive and time consuming Same with planetary shields. Etc. The idea then is that scarcity relates to highly productive/strategic worlds. If you control dozens of systems perhaps only a half a dozen planets would be highly productive, the rest would still be important, some vitally so, they could offer smaller boosts to your industry or tech or just be of strategic value but the results would be far more realistic and the pace of the game would mitigate the chances of a runaway effect. (This would also do wonders for the micromanagement issue) Well Gents, this as always, is just my opinion, feel free to have at it.
A quick note, I agree with what you said about Stellaris and the war score. I know what Paradox is hoping to achieve but does it in a very arbitrary and often times illogical way. Not perfect but ES 2 took a better approach (at least after Update 1). Eventually a peace deal is formed, and you get to keep what you took. So if you took half his Empire, that's what you get, not just these 3 planets. Also, you can refuse the deal but trigger a morale penalty (which makes sense as war weariness would settle in to even the most warlike race). It's more organic (you keep what you won, along with a healthy tribute if you have the upper hand still) and you can still reject the offering if you think you can easily get more before your people tire of the war. You are also rewarded to having a high morale Empire, because you can refuse more deals before it is an issue thus letting you take more and maybe even take out a large Empire. In Stellaris it doesn't matter how big and powerful you are, how motivated your people are, even if you can stay at war for 100 more years. You can claim all their planets and it still wouldn't matter (in ES 2 that would take out the enemy and give you all his worlds), in Stellaris you will only be able to claim these 3-5 worlds. At least at release you could vassalage any Empire, if you couldn't annex them fully in a war, you could do so slowly with influence and time, but they changed that and you can't do that anymore. TLDR, not all wars should be 100% steamroll annexations so pacing them is not intrinsically bad, but the mechanics need to make sense and give the player space to maneuver in.
Totally agree, If I had to handle this problem quickly I would look to Microprose Birth of the Federation. Here range (supply) was determined by distance from the nearest shipyard or base, I would modify this. The object would be to create a border that allowed the player to strike in breadth quickly but not in depth until a base could be built. The results are obvious especially if tied into morale. This suggestion could tie into what I offered on shipyards quite nicely especially if even the simplest base (supply depot), took 8-10 turns to build. Shipyards as previously suggested would be too valuable to build just for range so you know the player wont spam. Research of fuel cells would still stay but also act as in BotF, meaning the distance from base that can be traveled (supplied) would increase. This type of solution would be more subtle, you are simply highlighting supply more by keeping it tied to bases and you certainly slow conquests down as long as costs and ranges are balanced well. Edit 2056 also had a variation of this, an alien planet did not extend range without the proper structure. Here, the effort must not be as trivial and quick though, no building in 2-3 turns. All ships should have equal range with lighter ships perhaps having faster strategic speed as BotF It's border control tying into economics and existing mechanics Plus it should be plausible I think
Here’s how I see the same problem after thinking about it. What’s causing it? Three factors I see are Economic imbalance Front moving quickly during war Inability of defender to resist So, rather than create a gimmick I would look to address these things Economy should be tight even for large empires, the U.S. with the largest forces in the world is 20 trillion USD in debt, has crumbling infrastructure and ineffective social services. Adjust the game economy during testing to insure that it is difficult to gain a situation where money is not an issue. (Scarcity helps) That stuff I said about ranges, simplify it. A homeworld gives range All other planets (one needed per system only) require a supply depot to give range (building a supply depot doesn't need to be as time consuming as originally suggested) (This would also add some strategic value to certain systems that would otherwise not have it.) A newly occupied system suffers a period of unrest during which time it cannot produce, thereby delaying the construction of a new supply depot. There can be variables on how quickly unrest is removed but the effect will give the defender time. Supply depots also favor the defense in that you can lose them (and the maintenance cost that goes with them) but still fight effectively on interior lines, the offense will not have this benefit. Mothball or reserve fleets would also help. I think this should give the similar results to what paradox was striving for but not seem contrived at all. As far as annexations go or territory taken, keep it Moo2 like as the above will still make rolling through someone quickly unlikely. Wars now will stand a better chance of being multi-battle affairs as they should.
I think one thing that could easily introduce "scarcity" is population. If you think of it, population was quite strange in MoO2: You started with a population of 8 million (!), which grew quickly, new colonies would catch up with (and often over-take) the homeworld quickly, and you would end your game with a few 100 million population. In the real world, the population of the homeworld is rather in the billions, and population growth for an advanced society is minimal or even negative. So a way to control game development and keeping from "running away" would be to introducce a more realistic population development, and then tie production much stronger to population. So you would start with 8 billion population on your homeworld (of course, a better way to allocate them to the different fields of production would have to be found, but that is as easily done with rulers as by moving individual settlers like in MoO2), but perhaps only a small fraction of these billions would actually work for the empire (as in the real world). Many of them might also be poor (not contributing surplus production or science, just consuming food). Population exported to other worlds would be better educated, less poor, more productive, and more likely to contribute to empire production (perhaps also a bit more likely to procreate, although that could also be further improved with technology). If you think of it, Elon Musk does not suggest we send a few settlers to Mars which then procreate until they reach 1 million inhabitants - rather, he wants to send a million people there, which then might grow a bit further by procreating. Same should be the approach to population development in the game. With time, the colonies would start to very slowly catch up with the homeworld (while you also improve the conditions on said homeworld, thus keeping it competitive with the rest of the empire), but that should only happen late in the game. The homeworld should be at the heart and brain of every empire, at best balanced by the might of its colonies. Since all civs start with a homeworld having a few billion inhabitants, no such "runnaway" could happen. On the other topic raised by ChrisKonstantine, I agree that colonizing an inhabited world shouldn't be just like another continent on Earth. I don't think it is a given that "alien bacteria/viruses" would be a problem (since they are not adapted to human physiology, and its unlikely that their metabolisms would be able to live off human hosts), but its certainly possible that alien life might have non-positive consequences for human colonization. For example, what if a common compound of an alien biology is also toxic to humans or Earth-based life in general? That would make it nearly impossible to colonize the planet using indigenous plants - everything would have to be imported. So the way I would deal with this is that every biosphere can either be supportive, neutral or negative towards any player species, and the player has to find out using research before starting colonization (the player could start colonization nevertheless and just live with the consequences). If a biosphere turns out to be hostile, there is only two options: leave it be (no colonization, but live with the risk that another civ might find the world habitable), or sterilize the planet and populate it again with your own biology. If its neutral, you don't get any bonuses (its as if colonizing a desert world), and only if the influence is positive, you get some bonuses like surplus food production, etc.
Yes, population would certainly do the trick, especially if tied into industry and economics. You know, sort of how it is in real life
Yes - but I do think that many of these games are predicated on the assumption that the 20th century population boom will just go on and on and on... To get anywhere near the Earth's population within centuries, you need settler families with 6, 8, 10 kids. And then there's the Doomsday Argument, but we digress... So I think a more realistic population "mechanic" would help make the universe feel more "real" - spread out your settlers among the stars, but don't spread them too thinly, or you might end up without any worlds worth defending...
A very astute observation, children went from being an asset in centuries past to a huge financial commitment at present, particularly in more advanced societies. I'm sure other factors play a role as well but if we extrapolate from here it makes the Moo2 population mechanic seem even less plausible. I agree with you that it should be more a matter of shifting and migrating existing population rather than such unrealistic growth rates. Certainly life span extension techniques and perhaps cloning could play a role somewhat, (at least in game terms) but you have hit the proverbial nail on the head. Population growth is not only un-realistic in these type of games but also causes the games to suffer from some runaway effects that diminish the overall experience. In my opinion growth should be toned down, doesn't need to be eliminated totally or reflect reality perfectly as it is a game but the way it currently stands in most games leaves much to be desired.
